Riskthinking

Author: Ron Dembo In 1979, American IT company Electronic Data Systems were worth about $1 billion. Their head, Ross Perot, wanted to invest in a small computer company to supply software. …

Author: Ron Dembo Canadian real estate developer Paul Reichmann saw billions of dollars flow through his hands while transforming the city skylines of Toronto, New York and London. …

Author: Ron Dembo Eggs in the basket; cash in hand; rainy day funds — whatever you like to call it, having liquidity is an easy hedge against the unknowable risks of a radically uncertain world. When I started my former company, Algorithmic's, I remember people introducing me as a serious risk taker. I…

Author: Ron Dembo Throughout California in the United States, wildfires frequently devastate large swaths of forest and encroach on residential areas, forcing evacuations and even costing lives. …

Author: Ron Dembo Like many in the entertainment industry, The Shaw Festival in Ontario faced a bleak outlook for 2020. Over a typical year the theatre company generated $220 million in economic activity. But as Covid-19 swept across Canada and the rest of the world at the opening of the year and millions…

Author: Ron Dembo Often, a system fails because it mistakenly attempts to apply a deterministic solution to a radically uncertain or stochastic situation. When you face uncertainty, there’s often no ‘correct’ or ‘perfect’ solution to a problem — no perfect hedge that can save you from all the potential downside…

Author: Ron Dembo Sitting behind the wheel of his green and blue Basko Supermercati delivery truck on August 14, 2018, Luigi Fiorillo looked up at a darkening sky. …

Author: Ron Dembo On a frosty afternoon in January 2009, US Airways Flight 1549 prepared to depart from New York City’s LaGuardia Airport. The captain and pilot-in-command of the Airbus that afternoon was Chesley B. “Sully” Sullenberger, a 57-year-old, silver-haired former fighter pilot of the US Air Force Academy with…

Author: Ron Dembo Let’s say you are trying to decide between purchasing stock in Tesla and General Motors. Both of those stocks have an uncertain future. But not the same uncertain future. The risk factors affecting the profits for Tesla over the next year — like competition in the electric…