Gordon Pepper has the unusual combination of an economics degree from Cambridge and actuarial training. Immediately after he finished taking examinations, he became a dealer on the Floor of the London Stock Exchange. His 'postgraduate university' was the market place, where he underwent the harshest of disciplines. Forecasts based on conventional theories were often wrong. The inescapable conclusion was that these theories were either incorrect or incomplete. Pepper was the joint founder of W. Greenwell & Co's gilt-edged business (that is, the UK government bond business), which arguably b...