r/Series7exam

I’ve passed the SIE, S6, S63 and S65 all on my first try. Studied under a month for all. I took a S7 practice exam cold (before any studying) on STC and got 57%. I need to pass the S7 by the end of July for my job (advisor) and have been slacking since I did the others back to back and am burnt. A lot of chapters I’ve been able to skim because there’s so much overlap from prior exams. Can I cram in two weeks and pass this thing? How would you compare it to other FINRA exams as far as difficulty goes? S65 was the most difficult for me so far, SIE/6/63 were all a breeze. Is the S7 the one that’ll finally bite me in the ass?

I passed my sie and my series 7 on the first try, but failed my series 63 by one question. My retake is on thursday and i’m scoring low - high 80s on achievable program. I’m terrified of failing again, any tips or tricks will be greatly appreciated.

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Hi everyone started a new role and my firm is giving me essentially 4 weeks of study time using pass perfect. Roughly 2 chapters a day for 2 weeks and 2 weeks of practice exams.

Although they give me a retake if I fail within 12 points, please give me your suggestions on how you recommend I approach it and those that have used Pass Perfect how it was for you compared to the actual exam.

I had my SIE done in January and attempted my 66 about a month ago but failed by 1.

I honestly thought I was done for. I got what felt like a brutal draw, lots of AMT, Regulation D, municipal securities, and disclosure questions.
I marked around 40 questions for review and was only confident on maybe 20% of the exam. I used the full 3 hours and 45 minutes.
This morning I was only scoring 50–60% on Kaplan custom quizzes.
Until now I still don't know much about AMT. I was already mentally preparing for a retake, and somehow I still passed

Kaplan Sims: 77-83
Kens Brutal Exam: 77

Actual test is easier so this score range should be comfortable. Also watch Kens vs GPT video, a few exact questions came up.

Good luck!

It’s been proposed, but it’s not a rule yet there is a timeline for all this

Hi everyone, just thought I would share a word of encouragement. After failing the 7 twice using STC I finally passed today on my 3rd attempt! My secret to success was switching to kaplan and watching Ken Finnens videos. IMO Kaplan over prepares you for the 7 which was what I needed after being under prepared both times previously. I did get lots of options questions (at least 20), BUT if you are used to grinding out Kaplans brutal Q bank options and watch Ken's videos you'll be golden. Kaplan IS harder than the real 7 exam. I was scoring high 70s into the 83 range on simulated exams and 68 on the mastery. If I can do it, you can too!

A test that cost me my job and nearly cost me my career is now behind me. After coming up short last summer with a 70%, I was content never to take it again. However, I was later approached by an industry friend who said they wanted to hire me as a consultant/placement agent; all I would need to do is pass the 7 (already had the 63 in hand).

With help from Chris Kimbel's Built for Passing, re-reading the entire Achievable textbook, and lots of time with the Kaplan Q-Bank, I can finally say that this morning I passed the Series 7.

This was no easy task coming from a person in his late 40s who is busy raising two little kids and has a mild case of dyslexia. Chris put me on the right track by having me master 4 areas before wasting time on a practice exam. The four areas that I recommend everyone know cold are: Bonds, Equities, Munis, and Options. I also used Ken Kinnen's YouTube videos to help master each area.

This morning, I was literally giddy whenever I saw a question about options. In conclusion, DO NOT EVER GIVE UP! DO NOT EVER GIVE UP! If I can pass it, everyone can.

Thank you, Chris, Ken, and everyone on this thread who provides positive support and vibes.

Bottoms up this 4th of July weekend!

So I took my series 7 today and despite all my scores on STC indicating I was ready... I failed by 2 points :( For starters I will say studying while working a full time job made this beyond difficult for me, but I hustled and got to work at 6:30AM everyday to study before the workday instead of waiting to be exhausted after work to do so. I read the STC textbook, did the chapter exams, watched our favorite guys on Youtube, got the paid options course, and honestly I felt good this morning going into it. SO IF ANYONE GOT UNLUCKY LIKE ME I NEED TIPS ON HOW TO FEEL MORE CONFIDENT THE NEXT TIME!!

But just looking at question 1... I knew I was lucky if I even came close to passing.

Heres a list of questions I got/didn't get that surprised me:

1. Options: I did not have even one breakeven or max gain/loss question on options... I was soooo annoyed because Ken made me a SME at them and I didn't even get to use my skills. For options I had a lot of when you use certain strategies, which I expected, and a lot of what types of options contracts you can buy in very specific accounts. That through me off a bit. Last point I'll make is none of the options contracts provided had premiums and used this terminology I never heard before (e.g., George buys 1 XYZ April 60 call because he hears XYZ is about to release major news that is going to make their value go up. He closes/covers at $12. ) - what does closes/covers at $12 mean given the lack of context in the rest of the question...

2. Taxation: I had SOOOO much on taxation. However the exam does not just say "You buy at X price, hold it for Y days before you sell on secondary market at premium, what is your gain or loss?". It gave me the most nuanced questions possible to the point where any and all knowledge I had went out the door. I had easily 40 questions just on "minimizing tax liability" - and no they were not talking about muni bonds all the time.

3. Length: The exam questions were literally paragraphs long. I think I spent more time on the exam reading the freaking question than actually picking the answer. That alone made me waste so much time that I realized I had an hour left and was on question 60 of 130. I did not have time to review any of my questions, which kind of makes me confident that I know enough to get so close to passing.

4. Math: The only math I got tested on was profit and loss relating to taxation, dividend payout ratio, P/E ratio, current yield, accreting, and calculating buying power as it relates to LMV and debit balance. No margin calculations.

5. Suitability: Know your suitability!! If you think you know suitability, go back at it again because they really give you the most complex scenarios possible. They were not as easy as I thought so I'd suggest really tuning up on more so when RR is communicating with accredited and institutional investors and when they are to step in vs let them invest in something. Search for questions that start off easy but have a lot of implications, nuances, and know what makes someone a retail investor vs accredited vs institutional.

6. Products: You need to know when to recommend every type of product/investment vehicle and when/why people would want to use it. That was majority of the exam.

6. Other notable topics: when to send disclosures and what is required to be said in the disclosures, when to report complaints, gift taxes, working capital, paid in capital, quick ratio, revenue vs go bonds, know the types of funds, know whether premiums are included in capital gains/loss calculations, how prices and maturities are impacted by changes in interest rates, and private activity bonds, when to use NAV vs POP.

7. Things That Were Referenced That Weren't Familiar: muni bond ladder, corporate bond ladder, series EE savings bonds, whats included in liquid cash calculations, how strike price is determined in the market, short term debt with long term maturities, asset turnover ratio, and something called market on close order.

When I tell you I was so stressed. Lost my Girlfriend, car blew up, moved out to a different state where I work now in hopes of obtaining a better life for myself and accomplish some milestones with my investment company. Failed the first two times and put a lot of hard work in to pass this third. If you’re going to take anything away from this, believe in yourself!!! I had everything going wrong with my back on the wall, so can you. Thanks everyone in here for all the advice and tips!!!

I finally get to join the "pass" club!!! Studied on/off since September and got serious in Jan. Failed in March with 68 and was determined to get it round 2.

Today's been crazy. I woke up at 2 am nervous and could not go back to sleep. Around 4 I gave up on going back to bed and put on ken's chat gpt 50 question exam before my 8 am exam. i kid you not there was an exact question from the video on my exam (the parity bond one). even had all the same answer choices.

in preparation for round 2 i upped my practice exams to 3-4 a week and in between i'd watch videos on the sections where I missed the most questions. I responded well to s7gooroo lectures and ken's option membership. pay for the membership dammit!!!! watch all of ken's brutal exams and anything related.

they say confidence is key. in the last 24 hours i would randomly yell "I'M GOING TO PASS THE SERIES 7" and i think a lot of it was more of confidence that i didn't want to take the exam again LOL. it helps to have a vision of what life will be like once you pass the exam going in. this is a place where i severely lacked on my first exam.

topics that came up on both of my exams besides the obvious: hedge funds, rule 147a, fund of funds, american vs european options

the only question that completely threw me off was asking about how stock spinoffs are taxed or something like that?? i don't remember what I put. just prayed it was a non-scored question.

To those who are gearing up for round 2: YOU CAN DO IT! Just have to get aggressive with your studying to have aggressive confidence!

I took the day off to pass the exam now I'm going to throw away all of my materials. Ciao!

BACKGROUND:
Took my test today and passed! Been almost 2 years since I took the SIE so was a bit rusty. I studied for around 6 weeks and used training consultants as my main and supplemented with Kaplan qbank and Claude.

I had a a bit of a weird situation where I took the test last week and around 75 questions in, FINRA servers went down and my exam crashed. They tried to fix it but couldn’t and I was forced to reschedule and take it again this week. On the bright side, I got familiarized with the question style and the interface. I also saw at least 4 of the same questions from the first exam on the exam today.

MY DRAW:
I don’t know if I got an easy draw or was just prepared but felt pretty confident clicking submit. I got a ton of option questions (maybe more than 20), good amount of muni and investment companies, decent amount of suitability, more than expected number on annuities, like 3 questions on tender offer timelines, less than expected number on GSE securities, and one measly margin question.

MY ADVICE:

1. Trust your knowledge for what you know, be confident in what you don’t know.

When you get to a question and you know it, DONT SECOND GUESS IT, just input your answer and move on. For stuff you don’t know, don’t panic or let it nick your confidence, take your time and take your best educated guess.

2. Study everything and try to have a good understanding of it all. A lot of the material you study and memorize won’t be on the test but it might help you rule out an answer choice on a question.

Everything is fair game and most of what you study won’t be on the exam. BUT, it could help you eliminate an answer choice. Many times I was able to rule out an answer and make a better educated guess on a question because of comprehensive knowledge.

3. Don’t let practice exams be the end all be all for everything (I fell into this trap). The practice exams are nothing more than a tool so if you score poorly on one exam don’t let that dictate your confidence.

Yes, Kaplan and other practice exams are way harder than the real exam. And that is a good thing as it really makes you understand small details. I found the test to be way easier but that’s not to say that the practice didn’t help drill the material into my head. In the end, practice exams are just a tool to help you learn so don’t let your scores dictate everything. Also, just because a question is difficult on a practice exam never just chalk it up to “oh I’ll never see that” because sure enough you will.

4. Don’t forget the main stuff. Throughout my studying (especially near the end), I noticed that I went down a rabbit hole with small little details and it caused me to ignore the most basic concepts and formulas. This past few days I focused mainly on simple need to know stuff (Ken’s guerrilla video is great for this). Be sure to know all the main topics like the back of your hand.

This is my biggest critique of study providers. They do this thing that they get so fixated on the smallest things that they ignore the main content.

5. BE CONFIDENT GOING IN. FINRA wants to make you feel confused and like you’re failing… DONT LET THEM!!! For some asinine reason, FINRA thinks they’re better than you. WELL GUESS WHAT?!? THEYRE NOT SO GO SHOW EM!!!

Do whatever you got to do to get yourself fired up and don’t let your confidence waver. Never admit failure and go in with a f*ck you attitude and it will help in answering questions. If at any point during the exam your brain tries to convince you you’re failing, tell it to shut the f up.

Best luck to all and you got this!!

I passed this morning. Felt like an options exam, which was fine with me, thankfully. Lots of investment company comparison/contrast Qs. Fair amount of munis. I was averaging 78% on my last 4 Kaplan practice exams. Spent countless hours on YouTube reviewing weak areas and finished well over half the Q bank. Also spent a few afternoons following along with explicated exams on YouTube, which I found extremely helpful, listening to other people's reasoning on judgement Qs. This was my second attempt, first score was 64%. Bless y'all

Exam tomorrow.

Kaplan Sim scores: 77-83
Kens Brutal exam: 77

Good chance?