hi

I used to do be very interested in getting a CFA later on, so did a mini research in it. Hopefully my memory din fail me.

CFA is just another professional cert like ACCA, CPA etc. but difference is that CFA is specific to financial personnels and ACCA to accountants. Thing is, you don't really necessarily hav a degree in finance or some other biz related degree to take it. Pre-req is to hav at least 3 years exp in the financial field. It's usually a passport 4 ppl 2 the higher management of a company and it's not that easy to pass with passing rate less than 30% per year (not sure of the exact figure but one thing is certain, passing rate is low).

The way to obtain CFA is a bit similar 2 ACCA in the sense that you've got 2 pass paper 1 before you go on to take paper 2. There're 3 papers you'll need 2 pass before you can get the cert. If you fail, then you retake next year. If you didn't fail any of these paper, then you'll complete everythin in 3 years time. There's still one step away from puttin the CFA designation in your name card. My fren's bro passed his CFA but he still can't use his designation because of something but I can't remember. Oh ya, and accounting forms the 'meat' of the CFA curriculum (that's wat a Singapore university lecturer told me bout CFA. He's from Nanyang Technological University)

Btw, CFA isn't the only way. You can take an MBA specialisin finance or take up a post grad in quantitative finance. Quantitative finance is a very computational subject, so ur math gotta be good la. From wat i research, seemed like quite a lot will go into hedge funds after that. But then again, it highly depends on yourself. For more info, you can google it or search in wikipedia.

Hope this helps. Cheers!

btw, if ur really plannin 2 go far in the finance field, I think what counts is your exp, not so much of your formal education (but having a professional cert does give u an edge). Plus, to really go high, it is really very demanding and you'll practically hav no life esp in the beginning...

They say that finance is still not that big in Asia as compared to in US. So if you really wanna go ultra high, the market is in the US. You can see the country which produces the most CFA is north america. otherwise settling as a financial analyst in a company would do oso. depends on you mostly.

yeah... it's either you've got a 4-year bachelor or 4 years of relevant working exp. and there's 3 levels of study in the CFA prog, used the wrong word. sorry.

This post has been edited by singularity: Oct 31 2006, 09:27 PM