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A comment on Ask HN: What other low-probability high-impact events are we ignoring?. Parent comment

Re:Ask HN: What other low-probability high-impact events are... by jessriedel on Tuesday June 15, 2010 @05:35PM (#1433949)
I think then your claim is that the true risk and the perception of risk are very different, not that default is necessarily likely (i.e. > 50%). If you were really confident that default was likely within 20 years, you could make an awful lot of money shorting T-bonds (or something).
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Re:Ask HN: What other low-probability high-impact events are... by randombit on Tuesday June 15, 2010 @09:00PM (#1434375)
You can buy credit default swaps in T-bills, so if the US defaulted you could make a nice return - if you think you can find a counterparty in the form of a large insurance company or bank who would actually survive a US default, which seems unlikely. An article in the Economist (IIRC) made the comment that these CDS's had best be denominated in Kalashnikovs and cans of spam.
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