2016 Quantitative Methods Review

This short review course on CFA Level 1 Quantitative Methods will give you a quick recap of all Quantitative topics for the CFA exam. This course cover the important quantitative techniques essential in financial analysis which are used throughout the CFA Program curriculum.I will cover all important topics including Time Value of Money, Discounted Cash Flow Applications, Probability Concepts, Common Probability Distributions, Sampling and Estimation, Hypothesis Testing, and Technical analysis. In ten short lectures of 10 to 15 mins I will help you revise the Quantitative methods course in around two hours and make you confident of passing the exam.

Section 1 lectures will cover several tools of quantitative analysis such as time value of money, descriptive statistics, and probability. Time value of money calculations are the basic tools used to support corporate finance decisions and to estimate the fair value of fixed income, equity, and other types of securities or investments. After this Discounted Cash Flow Applications and descriptive statistics are reviewed which provide essential tools for describing and evaluating return and risk. In the final lecture of section 1 probability theory concepts are needed to understand investment decision making under conditions of uncertainty.

Section 2 reviews discrete and continuous probability distributions most commonly used to describe the behavior of random variables. Probability theory and calculations are widely used in finance, for example, in the field of investment and project valuation and in financial risk management. Furthermore, this section explains how to estimate different parameters (e.g., mean and standard deviation) of a population if only a sample, rather than the whole population, can be observed. This lecture on Hypothesis testingpresents techniques that are used to accept or reject an assumed hypothesis (null hypothesis) about various parameters of a population. The final lecture goes over the fundamentals of technical analysis and illustrates how it is used to analyze securities and securities markets. Technical analysis is an investment approach that often makes use of quantitative methods.

Be aware that this course is not a substitute for reading the CBOK. I urge you to read it to get a good understanding of Quantitative Methods and then use these lectures for quick and confident review before the exam.