IME study plan

Draft a complete investment policy statement for a hypothetical client, writing each of the required components: return objective, risk objective, time horizon, liquidity, taxes, legal and regulatory, and unique circumstances.

Distinguish on paper between the investment management process steps and the portfolio management process steps, then label where each IPS component enters the process.

Explain how risk tolerance, return requirements, and constraints interact, and write a short paragraph for each of three client profiles showing the trade-offs.

Solve at least 15 practice questions on IPS construction and process fundamentals, and record every miss with the reason it was missed.

Build a client discovery questionnaire that captures goals, values, constraints, and behavioral tendencies without leading questions.

Convert three distinct client scenarios into quantified, time-stamped goals with funding amounts and priorities.

Compare risk profiling approaches, including questionnaire-based, utility-based, and behavioral methods, and identify the failure mode of each.

Practice adapting a goals-based plan when a client's stated risk tolerance conflicts with the return required to fund their goals.

Derive capital market expectations using both historical data and forward-looking building blocks, and note where the two methods diverge.

Estimate expected returns for at least three asset classes and justify each input in writing.

Construct two strategic asset allocations for different risk profiles and explain the role of correlation in each.

Apply at least two asset allocation approaches, such as mean-variance optimization and a risk-budgeting method, and compare their outputs.

Build an equity portfolio from a stated investment philosophy, specifying screening criteria, weighting scheme, and rebalancing rules.

Compute and interpret key equity risk and return measures, including beta, tracking error, and factor exposures, for a sample portfolio.

Construct a fixed income portfolio that matches a client's duration target and liquidity needs, documenting the sizing logic.

Analyze yield curve positioning and credit exposure decisions, and explain the interest rate risk of the resulting portfolio.

Compare active and passive implementation for both equity and fixed income sleeves and state when each is preferred.

Evaluate at least four alternative investment categories on liquidity, valuation, fee, and diversification characteristics.

Test whether adding an alternative sleeve improves a portfolio's risk-adjusted profile, and explain the limits of historical correlation evidence.

Compute and interpret the core performance measures, including time-weighted and money-weighted returns, Sharpe, information, and Treynor ratios.

Perform an attribution analysis that separates allocation effects from selection effects for a sample portfolio.

Identify the main portfolio risk sources and propose concrete mitigation steps for each.

Quantify the after-tax impact of at least three tax-aware strategies, such as asset location, loss harvesting, and tax-deferred versus taxable account placement.

Model a retirement drawdown plan that accounts for sequence-of-returns risk and required minimum distributions.

Compare investment vehicles, including mutual funds, ETFs, separately managed accounts, and collective investment trusts, on cost, tax, and control dimensions.

Build a manager selection scorecard covering process, personnel, performance, and fees, and apply it to two candidate managers.

Map fiduciary duties to specific portfolio decisions and write a short case analysis of a fiduciary breach.

Identify the standard of care, conflicts of interest, and disclosure obligations that apply to a sample advisory relationship.

Apply the ethical decision-making framework to two realistic dilemmas and defend the chosen course of action in writing.

List the key regulatory requirements affecting investment advice and note where practice commonly falls short.

Complete two full-length timed practice exams and score them by domain to identify remaining weak areas.

Re-teach the three lowest-scoring topics from memory by writing summary sheets without notes.

Revisit every item missed across the plan's error logs and confirm each is now understood.

Assemble a final one-page formula and concept sheet for last-minute review.