Lectures Led To Book

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30530, 27 August 1964, Page 2

Lectures Led To Book

They all laughed when Mr R- B. Bond told his Sydney business associates he was going to Christchurch, New Zealand, to lecture on how the stock exchange works. In down-to-earth Australian they told him he was “off his rocker.” But in six months more than 1000 men and women have attended his courses of lectures in various community groups and special classes. Considerably more than half have been women and only one has told him it was “all • bit over her head.” They were housewives, businesswomen, and girls in their first jobs with an eye to investing for the future. Some of the women already had an interest in the share market because of their own holdings, in the care of a broker, but few knew anything about the principles of investment He knew that the majority of shares in New Zealand were held by women, but the numbers who flocked to his lectures “staggered” him. The interest aroused in Christchurch in the Stock Ex-

change, once considered an exclusive club of the wealthy, has prompted him to write a book on investment procedures, which will be published in Christchurch for Australia and New Zealand. Because he is not familiar with market conditions in

England—and he has been asked many questions about English securities at his lectures—Mr Bond will leave next month for London.

There he will gain the experience he feels he needs before going on a lecture tour, adapting his book to the English situation and to be better qualified when he returns to New Zealand. He hopes to visit New York and Toronto to see American and Canadian Stock Exchange operations as well. He will be away about a year and is taking his family with him. Before deciding to come to Christchurch to lecture, Mr Bond was on the staff of a member firm of the Sydney Stock Exchange. He was one of six lecturers invited to conduct courses on the principles of investment for the exchange and the Adult Education Department In the first year of lecturing, the Sydney panel of six had a total enrolment of 75.

President—Mrs W. F. Winstone, of Auckland, was today elected president of the New Zealand Federation of University Women.—(PA.)