Which Saudi CMA qualification exam (CME) do I need?

The CMA's mapping

The Saudi CMA's qualification exams, the Capital Market Examinations (CME), map to five groups of registrable functions. The CMA set the mapping in its announcement of 7 November 2022 (CMA announcement), its CME page and its Qualification Examinations Guide, and it hasn't changed since the series became mandatory on 1 February 2023.

The third column is translated from each paper's FA exam page, which is in Arabic. The CMA sets the requirement and registers people; the Financial Academy (FA) runs the exams, including booking, fees, centres, study material, policy and Hadaf; CISI provides the A papers and works with the FA on the B papers (FA FAQ). The CME guide lists every paper's time, pass mark and fee.

In practice: many firms also expect staff in asset management to hold CME-1, and anyone registered for more than one function, such as managing and advising, needs the exams for each. Under the exams in use before February 2023, people registering for asset management roles also took the old CME-1 (the Financial Academy's page on the old CME-1 still describes an exemption for those registering for CME-4 and CME-5), which is why many managers hold both. Check with your firm's compliance officer.

Official pages disagree: One reading of the hard-to-extract table in the CMA's guide PDF adds CME-1B for the managing activity. The CMA's announcement, its CME page and the FA's CME-4 pages say CME-4A and CME-4B only, and this guide follows them.

Who counts as general

The general group is everyone the four specialist groups don't cover: the FA's CME-1A page says CME-1A and 1B are required for all CMA registrants except compliance and AML/CFT officers, securities brokers, managing-activity registrants and corporate finance specialists (FA CME-1A page). Article 19(b) of the Capital Market Institutions Regulations (CMIR) lists the functions that must be performed by registered persons:

• the chief executive officer (CEO) or managing board member
• the chief financial officer (CFO)
• board members and partners
• senior executives and department managers directly related to securities business
• the compliance officer
• the money laundering reporting officer (MLRO)
• staff who provide clients with securities business, such as sales representatives, investment advisers, portfolio managers, corporate finance professionals and brokerage professionals
• the IT officer at an institution offering robo-advisory services or arranging securities crowdfunding

Not published: The CMA publishes no role-by-role table for functions such as the MLRO, the IT officer, board members or the CFO. Check these with your firm's compliance officer.

CME-1 or CME-4?

CME-4 is for people registered under the managing activity, such as portfolio managers, fund managers and their investment analysts; CME-1 is for general registrable functions. Under the FA's exclusion rule, general functions take in roles such as investment advisers.

Figures are from each paper's FA page. The FA also says the CME 1 certificate qualifies its holder to invest in Nomu, the parallel market (FA CME-1B page); see CME-1 and Nomu. CME-1 and CME-4 cover each paper's format and syllabus.

Do I need CME-1 before CME-4?

No. The FA's CME-4A and CME-4B pages say no prior certificate is required, and the CMA's guide says the exams are open to Saudis and non-Saudis with no academic qualification required (CMA Qualification Examinations Guide). The FA's preparation course for CME-4B lists CME-1A and CME-1B as preceding programmes (FA CME-4B preparation programme), but that is a course order, not an exam rule. Some training sites call CME-1 a prerequisite for CME-4; the FA's exam pages don't.

The compliance route needs three papers

Compliance and AML/CFT is the only group that needs three papers, and the only one that borrows a paper from another qualification: CME-1B, CME-2A and CME-2B (CMA announcement). A first attempt at all three costs SAR 4,900 at current FA fees (1,100 + 2,100 + 1,700, from the pages linked in the table above). Outsourced staff are covered too: where an institution limited to managing, arranging or advising hands its CFO, compliance or MLRO role to an outside firm, the staff that firm assigns "must pass the qualification examinations required by the Authority, or secure an exemption" (Article 20(e)(3) of the CMIR).

There is no grace period for new hires

You can't start a registrable function and pass the exams later. Article 20(a) of the CMIR says "No person other than a registered person may perform a registrable function without the Authority's prior written consent", and Article 22(f) says an applicant "must not perform the registrable function until he has been registered by the Authority". Passing the exams, or an exemption, is a condition of registration (Article 21(d)), and the CMA aims to decide within 30 days of a complete application (Article 22(b)). There are only three exceptions:

• the Authority's prior written consent (Article 20(a))
• its general power to waive any provision of the regulations (Article 4(a))
• its tolerance of a temporary vacancy in the CEO, CFO, compliance officer, MLRO or IT officer role, while the institution seeks a replacement and has told the CMA who is covering (Article 20(c))

If you passed a CME before 2023

You can still register. The CMA's CME page says "All holders of previous CMEs certificates are eligible to be registered with the CMA as per their registrable function" (CMA CME page), and its 2022 announcement says they qualify without the new exams (CMA announcement). No official source sets an expiry date, a continuing professional development (CPD) requirement or a deadline for passing the second paper of a pair, and the CMIR contains no CPD rule.

Exemptions

Apart from holders of earlier CMEs, no exemption from the current papers is published, for the CFA or any other credential. Article 21(e) of the CMIR promises "guidance on eligible qualifications and criteria for an exemption from the required examination", but the CMA hasn't published it. The only other exemption on an official page belongs to the old series: the FA's page on the old CME-1 Part 2 describes an exemption from that part for Part 1 holders with CFA Level I who were registering for CME-4 and CME-5.

Not published: the CMA's exemption criteria, including for the CFA, and whether a long break from registered work means sitting the exams again. Ask the CMA through your firm's compliance officer.