Which course is better amongst MBA, CFA and investment banking?

Hi Rahul! If you are looking specifically for an investment banking position, an MBA may be marginally preferable over the CFA. The caveat here is that the MBA would most probably need to be from a Top-20 B-School. The Chartered Financial Analyst CFA is well worth considering if you are aiming for an entry-level position in investment banking. In the investment banking field, most entry-level positions are at the analyst level. This position demands a great deal of expertise in number-crunching and financial modelling skills that are best imparted by the CFA programme rather than an MBA. The CFA also has perhaps among the best ROIs of any educational programme, since the total hard cost of the programme over all three levels amounts much lesser than that of MBA. In return, successful candidates who obtain the CFA charter can look forward to a significant boost in earnings over the course of their careers. In summary, if you are fortunate enough to be enrolled in a top B-school, the MBA should be enough for you to get your foot in the door upon completion. But the CFA is increasingly becoming a viable alternative to jumpstart a career in investment banking, not least because of its scarcity value.

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The CFA is by far the cheaper option. This is to be expected; the largest proportion of CFA candidates are at university, so it's unlikely that hard-up students would want to fork out too much for the qualification. Relatively speaking, the CFA is an exclusive club. There are 135,000 people who have passed all three exams globally after the 28,884 people who got through level three in June 2016 are added in. Around 72,000 of these are in the US. So, I think you should go with CFA programme.

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The CFA is by far the cheaper option. This is to be expected; the largest proportion of CFA candidates are at university, so it's unlikely that hard-up students would want to fork out too much for the qualification. Relatively speaking, the CFA is an exclusive club. There are 135,000 people who have passed all three exams globally after the 28,884 people who got through level three in June 2016 are added in. Around 72,000 of these are in the US. So, I think you should go with CFA programme.

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If you are looking specifically for an investment banking position, an MBA may be marginally preferable over the CFA. The caveat here is that the MBA would most probably need to be from a Top-20 B-School. The Chartered Financial Analyst CFA is well worth considering if you are aiming for an entry-level position in investment banking. In the investment banking field, most entry-level positions are at the analyst level. This position demands a great deal of expertise in number-crunching and financial modelling skills that are best imparted by the CFA programme rather than an MBA. The CFA also has perhaps among the best ROIs of any educational programme, since the total hard cost of the programme over all three levels amounts much lesser than that of MBA. In return, successful candidates who obtain the CFA charter can look forward to a significant boost in earnings over the course of their careers. In summary, if you are fortunate enough to be enrolled in a top B-school, the MBA should be enough for you to get your foot in the door upon completion. But the CFA is increasingly becoming a viable alternative to jumpstart a career in investment banking, not least because of its scarcity value.

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