Fragile personal finances

Editor: Crass Cash

One of the best books I've read on statistics is Antifragile by Nassim Taleb.  He's also written Fooled By Randomness and the Black Swan.  Also excellent books.  

There really is no proper word that describes something that is antifragile in any language according to Taleb.  Something that is fragile weakens as it's attacked.  So the complete opposite is something that becomes stronger when it is attacked.  What's the point of this?  To become antifragile with your finances! 

In order to profit and become stronger while other's finances become weaker is what we're after.  

1. On the investment side you can do a couple of things that I know of.  You can buy large out of the money options that are cheap, but you can make a huge amount of money on if the market crashes.  The other option is to have a portion of your portfolio "short" meaning that you make money when the market crashes as well.  This is somewhat risky in my opinion because the stock market over long periods of time has grown not fallen.  
2. As for real estate you can pay off your debt.  This makes you more robust than antifragile, but sometimes that all you can do.  
3. As far as your personal finances go.  You buy a boat load of insurance!  House burns down, lose your job, become disabled, become sick, spouse dies, etc etc.  These are all types of options where you profit if something bad happens.  If you can afford it, load up on insurance it will make you more antifragile.
4. Own multiple currencies. When the civil war hit in the United States, Rhett Butler didn't have all of his eggs in confederate currency.  He had it spread around Europe for diversity and safety.  If the United States failed it would be the biggest Black Swan of our lifetime regardless of what country you're from.  The Swiss Franc is a great antifragile currency.  It often appreciates when others fail.