Interpretation of question wording

[Sarah Malone]

Hi, every now and again I meet a question where I seem to interpret the requirement completely differently to what is in the mark scheme.

In particular, the below is Q8 (ii) Sep 2023 P1:
Discuss the merits of domestic investment compared to overseas investment, with respect to achieving the long-term goal of the fund

The mark scheme goes on to divide the question into "advantages of overseas" and "advantages of domestic" but due to the question reading "discuss the merits of domestic compared to" I would not have thought the advantages of overseas would be in scope. I understand we want breath in our answers but with such time pressure I think it's also important we don't spend time writing things that are out of scope.

How can I interpret this question to be "discuss the advantages of both domestic and overseas investments" in order to answer it as the mark scheme does?

 

[Aman Sehra]

Hi Sarah,

In this instance, advantages of domestic can easily be translated into disadvantages of overseas. Eg advantage of domestic is 'avoidance of currency risk'. This can be easily be translated into a disadvantage of overseas, as it could be framed as 'exposure to currency risk'. The point it still the same. Because the word 'merit' is in the question, it isn't unreasonable to just focus on the positives, or 'merits'.

I hope that helps.