A Wall Street friend who deals in billion dollar derivative deals --- Puts and Calls --- sent me the following email which outlined a way to protect his investors against unexpected contingencies.
....Call me for pricing on the Puts, I'm an axed seller.
Michael
July 2008 LHC End of the Universe Putsby Johnny Debacle
People are concerned about an end of existence event that may be causedby the Large Hadron Collider and there is talk when the LHC is turned onin July 2008, that a super-collision here, a super-collision there and*bam*, no more Universe. This would doubtless be an event from whichmost investors have not adequately protected their portfolios. That iswhy Long or Short is now offering LHC End of the Universe Puts. It's asimple put option wherein the buyer retains the write to sell theUniverse at a strike price of "Existing". Based on our Black-Holes modelused to value all "end of the world" options, the July 2008 vintageoptions are currently priced at $20.
Link to purchase
Recommendation: These options are literally the only way to protect yourportfolio from the possibility that when the LHC is turned onmini-blackholes will form, come together and have a blackhole party thatliterally rips the (cheap) fabric of universe asunder.
http://longorshortcapital.com
From Wednesdays New York Times Gauging a Collider's Odds of Creating a Black Hole By DENNIS OVERBYEPublished: April 15, 2008
Today we require more than prayers that a scientific experiment will notlead to the end of the world. We demand hard-headed calculations. Butwhom can we trust to do them?
That question has been raised by the impending startup of the LargeHadron Collider. It starts smashing protons together this summer at theEuropean Center for Nuclear Research, or Cern, outside Geneva, in hopesof grabbing a piece of the primordial fire, forces and particles thatmay have existed a trillionth of a second after the Big Bang.