[cortesoft]

> all but guaranteed short of the US absolutely collapsing. And if that happens, then we’d all have bigger fish to fry.

I mostly agree with your assessment, but lots of governments have collapsed, and that doesn't mean that everyone loses EVERYTHING. Some people are able to retain some assets, if they have them in the right form.

I do think some of the hedges people take don't make sense, though... if your hedge is to keep a bunch of cash around, you aren't hedging against your risk because your risks are correlated - the event that will cause all your stocks to go to zero will also cause the dollar to go to zero.

If you are truly hedging against the collapse of the US, you would try to get assets that would survive that... lots of possibilities, and some of them make more sense than others, but all of them have their own risks, and some of those risks are way more correlated than people realize.