Almost 60% of the players have backed Dunne's strategy and invested part of their notional 10,000 with him. He is now trading almost 22% of the total pot.

"Sean's strategy is to identify a select number of high potential investments, be they currencies, commodities or shares, " said Chris Curran, marketing director of Delta Index. "He is free to search the world for opportunity. I would certainly say he is one to watch."

Readers have until 3pm tomorrow to enter the Celebrity Trading Challenge and could win 5,000 by investing in the most successful traders.

Readers should register immediately on the web page www. deltaindex. ie.

You can still register after that time and at any time during the six-week competition, but you will lose out on one week's trading.

With winners and losers, players could conceivably avoid the losses incurred by the traders in that first week.

From next Sunday on, the Sunday Tribune will carry a table of the weekly performances of the Celebrity Traders and the Top 25 players. Other celebrity traders include Michael Dwyer of Pigsback. com, Today FM boss Willie O'Reilly and John O'Shea of the humanitarian agency Goal.

Dwyer's commodity trading strategy is the second most popular choice of players so far, having attracted just over 50% of contestants and 14% of the total sum invested.

The competition begins at the start of trading on Tuesday and will run for six weeks until close of trading on 6 April. The leading player will receive the top prize of 5,000. and the leading Celebrity Trader 3,500 to be donated to their nominated charity.

Go to www. deltaindex. ie to register and take part in the Celebrity Trading Challenge.