Learn to be rich?

Coutts & Co becomes the latest private bank to launch a formal course designed to help an elite class of the young rich to manage their money.

Forty-five children of some of the bank's wealthiest clients and youthful self-made millionaires - including, it is rumoured, a child actor - will spend their days at Coutts' London headquarters learning how to look after their money. They will also be drilled in life skills of particular relevance to the young and rich, such as how to say no to friends looking for money to invest in harebrained schemes.

"If a friend comes to you saying, 'Give us twenty grand', you need to know how to do the due diligence on that," says Fiona Fenn Smith, head of strategic marketing at Coutts.

JPMorgan private bank, for example, has been running Next Generation programmes for many years. The bank operates in an even higher orbit of wealth than Coutts with clients needing a minimum of $25m (£12m). Their courses also cater for a slightly older group, ranging from 25 to 45 years old. It runs its schemes in glamorous locales around the world, including St Tropez and the Hotel de Russie in Rome.