Alan Bridger was born in the UK in 1965. He graduated in Economics (Bsc Econ.) from the University of Wales. In 1987 he joined Chemical Ban in London (now part of JP Morgan) working as an Interest Rate Swap accountant. He left the company in 1991 to become a Fixed Income Trader in the Financial Markets Division of Cargill PLC, the largest privately-owned company in the USA. In 1996 he moved to GNI Ltd (now part of Man Group), working as a broker at the London International Financial Futures Exchange (LIFFE). Since coming to Cyprus in 2001, he established a successful privately-owned hedge fund, using leveraged products to trade UK and US stock indices.