Okay so I've been putting off writing this post for a while but I think it might help someone in the same spot I was in. I failed the FM exam back in October and then again in February. Both times I went in thinking I'd studied enough, and both times the probability and interest theory sections just wrecked me. My score the second time was a 4 — literally one point away from passing, which honestly made it worse.
For my third attempt (scheduled for July) I completely changed my approach. Instead of just reading through the study guide cover to cover, I'm doing timed FM practice test sets every single day and tracking which topics I'm consistently missing. The difference is already noticeable — I'm actually understanding WHY I'm getting things wrong instead of just moving on. I'm putting in about 2.5 hours a day and have a 12-week plan laid out.
For anyone else grinding through this — what exam tips helped you most? Specifically curious about the derivatives section since that's still murky for me.