Tulipa

Today is a good day to talk about tails—fat tails, lean tails, long tails, short tails. All sorts of tails. A tale of tails.

The world runs on tails—all major historical events and every paradigm shift are tail events. The ordinary keeps the machine running, the exceptional keeps it efficient, but the extreme—the rare, the unforeseen, the impossible—rewrites the code entirely. The most significant transformations that redefine existence belong to the fringes.

Tails—those rare, extreme events at the edges of distributions—are fascinating and dangerously overlooked. Whether in nature or decision-making, tails dictate the most consequential outcomes. Yet, most people remain blind to them. Ignoring them means being forever surprised by the forces shaping the world. Recognizing their power is the key to resilience—whether by hedging against catastrophic downside or positioning for asymmetric upside. The real danger isn’t just in the tails but in failing to see them.

We systematically underestimate tail risks because they occur infrequently and defy routine intuition. People prefer simple, linear relationships, yet the biggest shifts—market crashes or geopolitical shocks—come from tail events.

We romanticize the artist who redefines beauty, the athlete who defies human limits, and the leader who emerges from obscurity. The stories that last are never about the expected but the improbable. Yet, for all this fascination, we remain blind to how much tails truly dictate.

If you bought a 10-strand bouquet of tulips at Tulip Day in NYC, congratulations—you just bought a piece of that tail.