Comments on: CFP VS CFA, Is There More Than One Letter Difference?

By: Howie

Howie — Thu, 29 Dec 2011 11:42:00 +0000

Pretty obvious you don’t know much about the CFA program. The level 3 actually has a large portfolio management component that looks at client needs much like a CFP would.

The differences between a CFA and a CFP? CFA will have a broader range of investment knowledge and a higher IQ. Doesn’t really make for a better financial planner.

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By: Sunil from The Extra Money Blog

Sunil from The Extra Money Blog — Sun, 03 Apr 2011 16:20:30 +0000

Andrew caps it all off with an excellent comment. as someone who has all three CPA, CFP and CFA, i am in total agreement, especially about the interrelation of the certifications, the commitment, practical applications, etc.

what’s ironic is that i use none of the three. but when i was working full time, having all three was a deadly combination in terms of practical use, value delivered to clients as well as financial rewards from my employers

By: Andrew

Andrew — Sun, 27 Feb 2011 21:51:01 +0000

The CFA charter is certainly more comprehensize in breadth of the curriculum and delves far deeper than the CFP. Historically “Financial Planners” were selected and/or hired by charterholders to be touch points with retail investors and the charterholder would be the one actually running the fund or building the structured product being sold. The CFP then came about as an attempt to legitimize this part of the profession. Not trying to ruffle any feathers with that statement, but that is just the facts on the two designations.
They are not necessarily mutually exclusive professional designations at this point. The CFA charter has been geared more or less to manage institutional money at present and has to some extent a lesser emphasis on some wealth management topics. Nonetheless, risk tolerance/aversity, suitability, tax management, and other such topics are central to portfolio management (only one out of ten topic areas tested) and I can assure you , as a candidate in the CFA program, they are tested for and well understood by anyone who has been awarded their charter. The point to all this finally is, If one were working for a small buy side RIA shop or even some other front office role at larger brokerage/ research shops, pursuing both designations could complement each other well. They are different animals none the less. The CFA charter is a huge commitment in terms of time and resources, far greater than the CFP, and you should be certain that you are prepared to make some significant sacrifices if you choose to pursue that route. It’s worth it, but it is quite difficult. Short story long getting both or one or the other just really depends on where you are at and where you are wanting to go. If it was only buy side analyst reasearch work, then the CFP would likely be of little value, for the above it could be found useful.

By: The Financial Blogger

The Financial Blogger — Wed, 09 Feb 2011 12:24:01 +0000

@Tim,

You need one if you live in Quebec. It might be different for other provinces.

cheers,

Mike.

By: Tim

Tim — Tue, 08 Feb 2011 21:01:54 +0000

You said that you need a degree to do your CFP. I went to their website and it mentions nothing of that. I think that may only be in the U.S.A. Please show me anywhere that it says you need a degree.

By: The Financial Blogger

The Financial Blogger — Mon, 30 Aug 2010 12:09:28 +0000

@ Arihant,

The CFA is definitely thougher than the CFP. However, I wonder why you would like to do both at the same time. They don’t really correspond to the same career path so you might do one of them for nothing.

What exactly do you want to do?

By: arihant

arihant — Sun, 29 Aug 2010 07:32:46 +0000

Hi,

If I wanna pursue both, then wat are my chances… n where I should concentrate more.

By: rustamkhan

rustamkhan — Sun, 09 May 2010 06:26:01 +0000

did you people read the following articles, will help you all immensely:
http://crazyfa.com/cfa-or-cpa
http://crazyfa.com/cfa-or-mba
by the way this article was interesting…

By: The Bull

The Bull — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 13:08:09 +0000

Like its properly mentioned above a CFP makes you a generalist with a more client focus approach. Its more comprehensive in the sense you are exposed to the different aspects of financial planning (i.e Investment, taxation, estate, insurance, risk, etc.). Of course you might have a CFP charterholder being a specialist in Investment with also a CFA designation or a CPA designation being a specialist in taxation. Being an MBA in Finance myself, I still believe from an advancement as well as recognition point of view in addition to have a Bachelor degree or Master degree it always pays to have either a CFP or CFA , of course depending on whether your job is more analytical or client centric. Its also good to know that a lot of financial jobs require you to be CFP or CFA in addtion to hold a degree.