Looking for a fresh start to the Series 7 exam 2025 is a new year to take a new approach. Especially, if your studying hasn’t worked in the past. In today’s post, we provide some tips on how to get over this difficult exam.
Series 7 Exam 2025: New Year New Approach
From our experience at Professional Exam Tutoring, studying for the Series 7 Exam is best done systematically.
To lay it out in quick bullet points:
- Read the textbook
- Take a full practice exam
- Review your practice exam
- Identify and do practice questions on highly weighted exam sections that are weak from your most recent practice exam
- Take another full practice exam
- Rinse and repeat steps 2, 3, and 4
This method has been found to work on the widest range of students in all of our years tutoring. Whether you are Ivy League educated, or didn’t make it to college at all, these steps, help weight the odds in your favor.
Another major advantage is that it provides you with a customized structure. You will know what to do day in and day out of your studying according to your needs.
If you have not tried something like this, we highly suggest you take this approach. Give yourself a needed break during the holidays if you are between exam exams, and try it in the new year.
Student Feedback
The large majority of students that work with a Series 7 Tutor from our company are those that have failed at least once. Most common, are those that failed once, and are looking for help the second time around.
For an unlicensed registered representative, this exam is often the most difficult. Based on student feedback, it won’t come as a surprise that Options continues to be the biggest challenge. Despite knowing some of the basic tricks like “call up, put down” there is much more to this section that continues to show up in 2025.
Spreads, straddles, and hedging are the three most prominent trouble areas. To answer questions within these subsections takes a multistep process. We generally find that students have no problem with each individual step, however, it is the layering that’s an issue. Often six or seven steps on top of each other are required to solve a problem.
Other student feedback we’ve received this year are problems with convertible bonds. Convertible bonds in the Series 7 curriculum are quite tricky. Typically they involve a calculation and then some analysis (e.g., should you convert, call the bond, or not convert?).
Given that they are a singular product amongst a wide sloth of testable products, some people ignore the convertible bond section. However, if you do this (and there’s nothing wrong with this), you just have to make up the points somewhere else. Other areas to bring up (with high weightings) would be municipal bonds, new issues, investment companies, or order types.
The Series 7 Exam has been legendarily difficult for decades. We continue to hear this year of some of the same problem areas. We expect this to continue next year and beyond. So, make sure you prepare yourself as best you can.
Make a Schedule (or Have One Made for You)
A big issue we constantly hear from students is not knowing what to study on any given day. In other words, students often have trouble prioritizing and scheduling for their Series 7 prep.
One service that we provide is a custom schedule of practice questions, and practice exams. We often find that this helps students stay organized, focused, and effective in their studying. Keeping your process systemized is a good way to help you build a routine. However, it’s important that you build an effective routine, not just any routine.
To this point, remember, this is a weighted exam. There are certain sections that are tested heavier than others. Therefore, it makes sense to weight your studying accordingly. Create a study schedule that accounts for the weights of the exam. That said, you should not only prioritize sections that are heavily weighted, but those that are heavily weighted and where you tend to score low.
Unlike the SIE exam, which is more broad-based, there are targeted areas in the Series 7. Here’s a list of priorities that we recommend you follow your study schedule:
- Options
- Municipal debt
- New issues
- Investment companies
- Margin
Beyond these, there are other sections that are still important such as DPPs, Suitability, Customer Accounts, and a few more. Be sure to incorporate these others into a regular schedule. Rotate through with practice exams periodically to keep yourself aware of areas you still need to clean up. All of this will amount to a more organized and structured study process.
Series 7 Margin in 2025: A Pain Point
The Margin section of the Series 7 Exam in 2025 is a familiar pain point. On the Kaplan QBank you will see it labeled as “extension of credit.” Make sure to do some practice questions here (e.g., specifically section 16.4 on Kaplan’s QBank).
The section is full of rules, regulations, and calculations. You will need to be able to understand initial margin requirements, margin calls, equity calculations, and the concept of a special memorandum account (or SMA).
Within the Series 7 Margin curriculum, most people have issues when it comes to short selling rules. In particular, calculating equity in a short margin account is confusing.
First, recall the formula: Credit – Short Market Value (SMV) = Equity
A big question we constantly get is: What is credit? Rarely do we see a formula spelled out in textbooks for credit, but here is one below:
Credit = Initial SMV + 50% Reg T of Initial SMV
Therefore, if you were going to short $10,000 worth of stock, your initial short market value would be $10,000. You would have to put up an additional 50% of your own money as a margin deposit. That additional 50% is $5,000.
If you put the two together you end up with the equation above:
Credit = $10,000 + $5,000 =$15,000
You can think of this as a cash pile that is sitting in your margin account ready to re-purchase the stock you originally shorted, ideally at a lower price. Since the credit amount is money that is sitting in cash it does not move with the market value of the stock.
In other words, if the value of the stock that you shorted goes from $10,000 down to $8000, you will have $15,000 in cash to re-purchase the stock in the market for $8,000. That will leave you with $7,000 in total equity.
Equity = Credit – SMV
Equity = $15,000 – $8,000 =$7,000
For more on the Margin section, check out our video course or give us a call.
Direct Participation Programs (DPP): Under the Radar
One topic that consistently flies under the radar is that of DPPs. Direct participation programs are often a low scoring section for most people.
Though the concepts of limited partnerships and general partnerships are covered in the SIE exam, this section goes a little deeper for the Series 7.
One issue with this topic is that there is an emphasis on real estate and oil and gas DPPs. Since both of these are popular types of limited partnerships, FINRA expects you to know a little about them.
For instance, you may be tested on the order of risk when it comes to an oil and gas DPP. You should know that from most risky to least risky are the following types of investments in oil and gas:
- Exploration/drilling
- Development
- Income
On the Real estate front, something you should know is that an investors cost basis will always include their share of debt from alone taken out by the partnership. In short, it does not matter if it is recourse that or non-recourse. The proportion of debt will be added to the investors cost basis.
Tax considerations are also important to know in the section. You should be aware that losses through a limited partnership investment can only offset gains in another limited partnership investment. They cannot offset ordinary, income or investment gains in public securities, such as those made in the stock market or bond market.
There’s plenty more to this section. Be sure to review it as there can be enough questions to cause some frustration if you don’t know it well enough.
My Friend Said…
In order to pass the Series 7 Exam 2025 is no different than any other year in terms of most people’s experiences.
We highly recommend not to take your friend or coworker’s advice/experience and assume that their experience can be extrapolated out to what happens to most people.
For example, there are no shortages of stories we hear from students about coworkers who barely studied, barely took any practice questions, barely had any background in finance – the list goes on – and still passed the exam.
Since FINRA does not provide you with a score if you pass the exam, it’s hard to know how well this other person actually did.
When it boils down to it, ask yourself if you would rather be like the person who sounds like they cut corners but still happened to pass (maybe by luck) or the person that puts in a valiant effort, so that in case you fail, you still know enough of the content to easily get over the hump the next time around.
We recommend that you watch out for the following bad advice:
- Don’t read the textbook
- Go straight to practice questions
- Take a shot at the real exam before studying, you might get lucky and pass
- You only need a week or two to study
Generally, speaking even the easiest of exams, like the SIE exam or the Series 63 exam (which are both still fairly difficult), take the average person somewhere between four and six weeks to study.
Make sure to allocate yourself enough time to read the textbook or watch videos. Without a base of knowledge, we highly recommend that you don’t take the exam. In our experience, employers don’t tend to care that you were just looking to see what the exam was like – they just see the end result was a fail. That increases pressure for you for the next time around.
Take it seriously the first time, and hopefully there doesn’t need to be a second time!
What to Do With Extra Time When You Finish Your Exam
If you find yourself finished the exam with more time left on the clock, our short advice is: Don’t leave!
Many people heard this a lot in college: “Go back over your exam and double check your work.”
Well, this may sound tedious, but if your job depends on it, it’s worth the time.
One counter intuitive tip that we often give folks that take our advice is the following: When reviewing your answers for the exam, start by reviewing questions in which you were confident.
The reason for this is two-fold:
- You will be able to review many more of your Series 7 exam questions since you will very quickly know whether you have the right answer or not.
- Statistically speaking, even if you’re confident on as little as 70 questions, you still probably got a small handful of those wrong. When you double check questions on which you’re confident however you are more likely to identify a silly mistake and be able to correct it.
Most people spend time at the end of their exam, going back over questions where they may have the answer down to a 50-50 split. The general issue here is often that people spend five minutes going back-and-forth between those answers and still never really know in the end.
Don’t waste your time on questions where you are uncertain. Review questions, and double check those that you understand. You are more likely to gain extra points there.
Don’t Take Notes on Everything
Your study notes are a very important part of your Series 7 studying. Though it may seem like everyone has their own method, there are definitely methods that anyone can implement to make sure you streamline your study notes.
One thing that works to save you time sifting through pages of useless notes is to make sure that your study notes are focused on your weak areas. Specifically, we recommend you not take notes on any topic, definition, or formula.
In other words, you should only be taking notes on topics you consistently get wrong. We say “consistently“ only because there’s no need for a note if you got a wrong answer once and then thereafter learned from your mistakes.
Also, we recommend that you avoid Quizlets that are not your own. Quizlet can be a helpful resource in creating your own flashcards and study notes. However, some people rely on other people’s Quizlets. That can be a mistake if the flashcards are incorrect, or incomplete. We’ve seen this many times with our students. The best approach is to make your own notes and make your own Quizlet. Despite the extra work, the notes will be much more customized to your knowledge gaps. That will undoubtedly help get you extra points as your knowledge base fills in.
Can AI Help Me Study for the Series 7?
Some students ask us about using artificial intelligence to study. It’s a good question: Is ChatGPT or Google’s Gemini helpful when it comes to studying for the Series 7?
The good news is that the answer is: Yes!
However, like everything with artificial intelligence, there are caveats. The most important caveat when using ChatGPT or Google’s Gemini is to know that most of the time you will get a correct answer, but in some instances we have found incorrect ones.
Most of the time, artificial intelligence platforms will scour articles, websites – like Investopedia – and maybe even public SEC Acts to reference answers. A common problem we find is when artificial intelligence references an old, or incorrect, article. For example, the settlement of some securities like stocks, as well as corporate and municipal bonds, recently changed from T+2 to T+1. Though many websites are up-to-date on this, those that have not been updated still reflect the old rules.
For more nuanced topics like calculating the maximum gain or loss of a debit spread, artificial intelligence can be helpful, but their steps in getting to the answer are unlikely to be explained in plain English. In short, they are often similar to a textbook in their explanations. AI is often correct in these explanations, however they may not be any easier to understand than reading your textbook.
Overall, using ChatGPT or other artificial intelligence platforms to study for the Series 7 can be very helpful. We would recommend them as a supplement in your learning process. But, we encourage you to use study platforms like Kaplan as your main resource.
Scored 80% on a Practice Exam and Still Failed the Series 7?
We hear often from students that believe they were prepared for the exam, but still fail by a few points. Sometimes, they fail (heartbreakingly) by a single point.
There are many potential reasons for this from our experience.
First, you should know that some Series 7 exam prep material is easier than others. In our experience, we have found Kaplan practice questions as the most reliable predictor of a students true score on the exam.
The good news is that if you are not using Kaplan, and you still have at least a week or two until your exam, you can purchase Kaplan’s QBank for around $70, as of this writing.
Note: We have NO association with Kaplan and receive no commissions for this recommendation. This is purely from our experience as a private tutoring company.
On that note, many curriculum providers have great textbooks so if you decide to switch over to Kaplan, more good news is that you would not have to reread the textbook! The overlap between most Series 7 textbooks is very high. For whatever reason it is in the practice questions where we see major differential.
On the other hand, if you were using Kaplan and cracked an 80% on a full practice exam and still failed, there may be a chance that you memorized some answers to questions, or you got an unlucky break on the actual exam and were tested on areas where you were particularly weak. Again, we have seen both of these outcomes happen, and others.
The best way to solve for this moving forward is to aim for practice scores in the high 80% range or even higher. Or, if you’ve memorized practice question and answers, then try to make sure as you are taking practice questions that you understand why not only the correct answer is correct, but why incorrect answers are not correct.
Though there are many possible reasons why students fail the exam, some of the most common ones are listed above.
One Good Score May Not be Enough
The ultimate goal for a lot of people, is to score 80% or higher on their practice exams. It’s an important mile-marker in that you usually can’t fluke your way to an 80% score. Statistically speaking, guessing enough questions right to get you that score is highly unlikely.
That said, it is definitely possible that you do get a practice exam that happens to give you a certain number of questions that happen to be in your wheelhouse. For this reason, we recommend taking at least two or three full practice exams with the goal of scoring 80% or higher (specifically using Kaplan material) before you go in.
That should give you the confidence and enough randomized questions thrown at you, to presume you can handle exams with a different variation of questions posed.
Although cracking 80% for the first time is an excellent place to be, with just a little more work and a few more practice exams with about the same score (or better!), you can go in with high confidence.
What’s New with the Series 7 Exam 2025?
Although we have no insight into what FINRA is likely to update on the exam, we believe there are some recent trends to watch. For instance, although convertible bonds are not a large part of the exam, you may see a few more than has been seen in the past. That is to say, a small handful, and not likely more than four or five questions.
What is not likely to change is the number of Options questions. Options heavy exams are still likely to show up, in our view. And even when presented with an Options-light exam, we would still expect more than 10 options questions.
Some other areas to make sure you understand fully would be municipal securities, order types, margin, and investment companies. It may also be worth your while to know enough about new issues. Specifically, the rules around issuing municipal bonds and other types of securities in the primary market.
Overall, the Series 7 exam in 2025 is likely to be quite similar to the recent past. We recommend you take a very systematic approach to studying, and feel free to reach out if you need any help. Good luck!