Do you know how hedge funds work?

Well you certainly would if you had been able to attend this year's Hugh Oldham Memorial Lecture at MGS on Monday. Old Mancunian Stanley Fink, known from his days at the Man Group rather affectionately as the Godfather of the hedge fund business, gave a highly challenging explanation of the contribution that hedge funds make to the financial markets and the economy.

With analogies including a visit to a horse racing meeting in Hong Kong, he explained the mathematical approach to movements in prices which is adopted by hedge fund traders. He also made clear that the over-simplification of these instruments in the press does little to explain the range of intellectual challenges they pose. His views on regulation are clear: already recent rule-changes have the Swiss authorities rubbing their hands as many firms move from London to Geneva.

Stanley Fink and his wife Barbara are also well known as philanthropists, and he explained the reasons behind their emphasis on educational, health and poverty-reducing charities. If you are lucky enough to make or have money, he said, it's your duty to send the elevator down to bring up as many more deserving people as you can.

The Hugh Oldham lecture follows an afternoon of seminars attended by Sixth Formers from a wide range of Manchester schools. We were fortunate to have a sparkling set of seminar presenters on Monday, many of them also Old Mancunians.

If you would be interested in attending future Hugh Oldham lectures, contact us in the Development Office at MGS to be added to our mailing list.

Back from half-term

The six o'clock alarm was a bit of a shock this Monday morning after a relatively light week when school was on half-term. I was on call as the Manchester contact for a trip to Poland, but completely unneeded as everything went to plan. A far cry from last half-term when I was kept pretty busy as the staff and boys on Desert Trek near Marrakesh suffered from unexpectedly high temperatures and keeled over with worrying regularity.

It's a good thing that the Dev Office staff can be involved in many of the pupils' and teaching staff's activities - soon we'll be sorting out the arrangements for Activities Week in the summer term when all teaching stops for a week and everyone goes to camp or takes part in a fantastic range of Manchester-based activities from rowing to cooking.

We're hoping to add Sir Ben Kingsley to the growing list of Old Mancunian stars of stage and screen who will help us to celebrate the opening of the new Drama Centre in the autumn. There can't be that many OMs whose appearances are managed by a New York-based publicist! We're now in touch and trying to make the diaries match. Sir Ben was last at MGS for an acting masterclass in 1998, following the launch of the Foundation Bursary Appeal.

For news of a successful young Old Manc entrepreneur, Jonny Goldstone, follow this link:

http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/transport/article7034889.ece

If you have news of Old Mancs' achievements, please let us know at oldboys@mgs.org.