This is utterly the wrong way to learn finance for quantitative trading. That would be an unproductive use of time.
Read Options, Futures and Other Derivatives and Algorithmic Trading and DMA and you basically know everything you'll get from public sources that could be meaningful for trading.
If he knows how to code and is looking for "mathematics of finance" he should start with those, not the CFA.
That is your opinion, but if you look at the resumes of scientific active equity fund managers and quants, they all have it. Just understanding the quantitative side leads to vast underperformance over the course of market cycles...
What resumes? Can you show me these vast numbers of resumes with CFAs? Are you talking about fund managers or quants? If your goal is develop quantitative trading strategies, you shouldn't be getting a CFA because it's superfluous.
On another note, even if what you were saying were true (and it isn't), it wouldn't demonstrate that it's useful to have the CFA. Certifications are usually helpful for HR or for regulation, not for actual knowledge. And everything you need to know about finance can be learned in far less than 1000 hours for trading if you're in a research or development role.
I feel like we're talking past each other. I'm talking about a role where you develop strategies as either a researcher or a trader. Higher up the chain, sure, I can admit there's a utility to the CFA.
I think the main issue is that you need a solid grasp of the qualitative side of finance to build working quant models. Pms are responsible for quant model construction and they all get cfas because that is base level finance understanding.
Quants don't usually have CFAs. A phD in physics is more common to see. CFAs help you working in a real financial environment where you need to be aware of a lot of stuff. If you want to day trade at home, it's close to useless. Please nobody gets a CFA if what you want to do is learning day trading.
If you are just gambling with math at home, dont bother. If you want to understand finance like the op, better start learning. They have phds and cfas...
If you want to understand finance 360, from compliance to settlements, from middle office to government bonds structuring, sure, get a CFA. But somebody learning to trade not only doesn't need one, but very little of what's in it is useful. I've been in finance for ~10 years, trust me, very few traders and quants have CFAs, that's more product management, research analysts, compliance, controllers, risk managers, even IT. We are not talking about learning those jobs.
The CFA doesn't cover settlements at all, nor does it have anything to do with gov bond structuring, and very, very little on compliance. (Basically the bare minimum you need to know on ethics and asset manager code of conduct/GIPS).
The vast majority of the CFA curriculum covers investing fundamentals, including accounting (100% necessary for building models), quant (obviously necessary), econ (pretty important).
Read Options, Futures and Other Derivatives and Algorithmic Trading and DMA and you basically know everything you'll get from public sources that could be meaningful for trading.
If he knows how to code and is looking for "mathematics of finance" he should start with those, not the CFA.