Should I retake?
The CFA® exam is not easy to pass. In June 2015, only 42% of candidates passed the level I exam, and that is a reasonably high pass rate compared to the recent past.
If you passed, congratulations! Go out and celebrate and forget everything about the CFA® Program for a little while.
If you didn’t. Analyze your results. The CFA Institute will communicate your total score band and score range achieved for each topic if you failed the test. Make sure to review this information in detail to gain an understanding of your strengths and weaknesses.
Was it a close call (score band 8-10)? Or do you pretty much need more work across the board (score band 7 and below). What do you think went wrong? Did you allocate enough time? Were there any unexpected events affecting your studies? Did you lack strategy and get lost in the sheer size of the material?
The answers to these questions matter. The closer you got and the less work you put in, the more I would recommend you to do it again. If however you ended up in one of the lower score bands despite pouring your heart and soul into your attempt then you either need to give up altogether or to apply a radically different strategy.
How much does it cost?
When you first signed up to the CFA Program you paid an enrollment fee on top of the registration fee. This fee is a one-off, so when you organize your exam retake you only need to pay the registration fee for your second attempt.
Look out for the fee deadlines however. The early fee deadline is more than 9 months ahead of the test. If you are going to retake the exam in December, you are clearly going to miss out on this one. There is however a late fee deadline as well on 19 August 2015. Please look out for this deadline as the you will currently have to fork up an additional $385 for nothing if you let it lapse. I have written an entire post about fee deadlines here, if you want to learn more.
Please note that the standard registration fee only covers the ebook version of the curriculum. If you would like physical books to be sent to you, you will need to add $150 to the fee plus shipping.
Did you use a 3rd party study provider last time? Some of these offer varying types of pass guarantees that kick in if you have to retake the test. Read the small print, as they may demand various conditions met in order to honor the guarantee. E.g. they may demand that you have logged into their online platform an done various preparatory tasks as a confirmation that you did actually use their service. If you do make use of a study provider make sure that you fulfill all of these criteria, just in case.
When to do your CFA exam retake?
I would generally recommend that you retake the test as soon as possible, but especially if you failed the June test, as you will be tested in the exact same curriculum in December. The trouble with a December resit is that you will not have your results until late January, leaving you with fairly limited time to prepare for the dreaded level 2 test next summer. Despite these concerns it is still worth it to push on and keep the momentum going. There aren’t many direct overlaps between the level 1 and 2 curriculum, but having recently revised the ethics readings and the formulas learned in quants, equities etc will support your level 2 efforts.
Strategy
So you failed, what now? Once you have finished analyzing your results. You need to use this information to re-evaluate your study plan. Were there any surprises? Do you work in asset management and stuffed up this segment of the test? Did you work your butt off in fixed the income with sub 50 scores to show for it? This sort of information is vital input as you engineer your retake plan
If you describe your current study plan in the attached form to the best of your ability. I will give you an honest assessment and ideas for what could be tweaked to ensure a better result this time around.