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| Level I CFA Exam | The Level I CFA Exam concentrates on the tools and inputs relating to investment valuation and portfolio management. Level I CFA Exam also introduces basic concepts regarding securities laws, regulations, and ethical and professional conduct. The emphasis here is on knowledge and comprehension.
The six-hour Level I exam includes entirely multiple-choice questions and is divided equally into morning and afternoon sessions. 120 questions are covered in the morning session, after that there is a lunch break. The remaining 120 questions are administered in the afternoon. The average time allotment per question is 1½ minutes, because some questions take longer to answer, and others require less time. The afternoon session covers the same topics as the morning session in exactly the same order. Note, each session is a self-contained unit: you cannot circle back and answer morning session questions in the afternoon.
 Exam Topics
Keep in mind, not all topic areas are given equal weight at each level of the CFA Exams. Although variations in weighting occur from year to year, and the categorization of multifaceted problems is open to some interpretation, an approximate breakdown of the relative importance of the different topic areas for the Level I exam is as follows:
• Ethical and Professional Standards, 10-20 percent
• Investment Tools 45-55 percent
o Quantitative Analysis, 7-17 percent
o Economics, 5-15 percent
o Financial Statement Analysis, 15-25 percent
o Corporate Finance, 3-13 percent
• Asset Valuation, 45-55 percent
o Equity Investments, 5-15 percent
o Fixed Income Investments, 5-15 percent
o Derivatives, 0-10 percent
o Alternative Investments, 0-10 percent
• Portfolio Management, 0-10 percent
Evidently, the Level I Exam emphasizes investment tools (50 percent of the exam) and the fundamentals of asset valuation (30 percent). In general, the largest single topic on the Level I Exam is Financial Statement Analysis, which includes Corporate Finance in the exam topic breakdown.
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