All the curriculum changes you need to know for Level I CFA® Program exam

AB Maximus
Apr 6, 2019
2 min read

Signing up for the CFA® Program exam in 2019? Here're all the curriculum updates you must know!

The curriculum changes guide in this post is copyright of and kindly provided by AB Maximus' textbook partner, Wiley Efficient Learning.

News of an upcoming inclusion of cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin into the CFA® Program curriculum made ripples in the finance world earlier this year.

But it isn't a one-off inclusion - just a big one that made headlines.

CFA Institute regularly revises and updates the exam curriculum every year to ensure that your study materials and tests reflect up-to-date knowledge. This is to ensure the skills you learn while on the CFA® Program are relevant and will give you the best chance to be a successful investment professional.

This year, our friends at Wiley have published a handy guide to the curriculum changes for 2019. Whether you're a new student tackling practice papers or a seasoned student retaking the exams, it's important to be familiar with these changes.

For a downloadable pdf of all the changes, please scroll to the bottom.

Changes to the 2019 curriculum are as follows. Content changes are marked in green, and study sessions with new names are marked in red.

*In general, study sessions have been renamed with simpler names. For example, Economics had 2 study sessions in 2018, called "Microeconomic and Macroeconomics" and "Monetary and Fiscal Policy, International Trade, and Currency Exchange Rates". The new names for 2019 will be simply "Economics 1" and "Economics 2".

Ethical and Professional Standards:

Changes to Reading 3: Guidance for Standards I–VII

Quantitative Methods:

Renamed from Quantitative Methods: Basic Concepts to Quantitative Methods (I)
Renamed from Quantitative Methods: Applications to Quantitative Methods (II)
Changes to Reading 8: Statistical Concepts and Market Returns

Economics:

Renamed from Microeconomic and macroeconomics to Economics (I)
Renamed from Monetary and Fiscal Policy, International Trade, and Currency Exchange Rates to Economics (II)
Changes to Reading 19: International Trade and Capital Flows

Financial Reporting and Analysis:

Changes to 8 readings: Readings 22, 23, 24, 25, 28, 30, 31 and 32

Corporate Finance:

Renamed from Corporate Finance: Corporate Governance, Capital Budgeting, and Cost of Capital to Corporate Finance (I)
Renamed from Corporate Finance: Leverage and Working Capital Management to Corporate Finance (II)
Changes to Readings 33: Corporate Governance and ESG: An Introduction

Portfolio Management:

Portfolio Management, split from one study session into 2: Portfolio Management (I) and Portfolio Management (II)
Changes to Reading 40: Portfolio Risk and Return: Part II
Changes to Reading 42: Risk Management: An Introduction
Changes to Reading 43: Fintech in Investment Management

Equity Investments:

Renamed from Equity: Market Organization, Market Indices, and Market Efficiency to Equity Investments (I)
Renamed from Equity Analysis and Valuation to Equity Investments (II)