Web Writing Guidelines

This guide contains a short list of the preferred CFA Institute editorial styles. For a more complete list of web writing and editing, please consult the CFA Institute Digital Style Guide.

Dates

• All dates on the website should follow the global date style: 22 May 2013 (day month year or day/month/year).
• Do not use a zero before days.

Times

• AM and PM should be uppercase.
• Include a space between the numeral and AM or PM.
• Hours should be written out (e.g., 9:00 AM, not 9 AM).
• On the website, we usually refer to just the Eastern Time Zone as “ET” and do not reference daylight savings or standard time.

Numbers

• Numbers one through nine are spelled out in text.
• Numerals are used for 10 and all higher numbers up to 1 million.
• If it is the first word in the sentence, always spell it out.

Currency

• Currency will be listed as currency type (using ISO currency codes), followed by a space, followed by amount.
• When in paragraph form or being used for marketing purposes and when the amount is even (no change), it is not necessary to include the decimal point and cents. For example: USD 849.