Sorry I just saw the title of the thread. The MSF is really useful if you want to get into the profession. The CMA is fine but most CMAs I know just have advanced knowledge of what top brokers know (different products, financial planning, bonds, stocks, etc..). The MSF is more for people who want to price derivatives, develop models, learn the details behind the different products and pricing, get more detail all around in stocks, bonds, options, futures, swaps, credit derivatives and other complex products. If you just want to trade then it might be more than you need lol.
Well when do you plan to start? Jan opening, you better hurry? MSF is the way to do it. A CFA is no real education, just memorization for 3 big tests. It is a good add-on after the Masters if you feel you need more letters at the end of your name. A good strong ed in the fiundamentals and a healthy return will get you the job quicker than a CFA. If you want to get on the cutting edge check out the CAIA.
From what I have seen the issue with pricing and model development these days is that they are hiring Phds in physics and math rather than MS's in finance -- that's anecdotal though. Being only moderately quantitative myself, my thought was that you could go the analyst/portfolio manager route with the CFA rather than the harder core quant route where you end up competing with extremely numerate and even more highly educated folks. I guess we'd need more input from the original poster as to what area of finance he wants to focus in. At least we have eliminated the MBA from the equation as unsuitable for a trading education.