Outlandish Fortune Tales

As traders and investors many of us dream of the big payoff; some magical rally or insider tip that transforms our portfolio beyond our wild dreams.

Of course, in this day and age there are so many opportunities to generate wealth, with some being a little more, shall we say, interesting than others.

Today we will be looking at people who have amassed a fortune in outlandish ways, or at least in ways that are out of the ordinary.

Make a Million With Math

In 2002, Russian mathematician Dr. Grigoriy Perelman made history for solving a famous mathematical quandary called the Poincare conjecture.

Solving this problem which has to do with four-dimensional space led to the Clay Mathematics Institute of Cambridge, Massachusetts awarding him with the Millennium Prize, which just so happens to include $1 million!

Funnily enough, Dr. Perelman declined to accept the award, so perhaps he doesn’t belong in today’s article after all!

Either way, you’ll be pleased to know that the Clay Mathematics Institute still has a further six $1 million awards to give away to anyone who can solve the associated mathematical problems.

If you fancy yourself as a mathematical prodigy then why not try your hand at the Riemann hypothesis. This problem has existed since it was first established by in 1859, and solving it will net you a cool million.

The Chinese Cardboard Queen

Starting a company with just $3,800, Zhang Yin of Hong Kong stumbled upon a beautifully simple yet nonetheless incredible idea.

In our modern era China has become well-known for being one of, if not the world’s leading global exporter of goods. With this in mind, Miss Yin decided to invest all of her savings into scrap paper from the United States.

Her reasoning behind this was that practically all goods are shipped in cardboard boxes.

All she had to do was buy scrap paper at low prices before converting it into higher value cardboard and then selling it on for a profit.

Thanks to this ingenious idea, Zhang Yin is now worth an estimated $4.6 billion, and as of 2010 she was the richest self-made female billionaire on the planet.

Bend it Like Branson

Richard Branson, the sixth richest man in the United Kingdom, is perhaps one of the most famous billionaires of them all.

What makes Branson so likeable is the fact that he found his fortunes in very humble beginnings.

For those of you who don’t know, Branson started out selling records from the back of his van. He would drive around visiting local record stores looking for heavily discounted albums that he could sell or a profit.

He specifically kept his eyes open for cut out albums, which were either excessive stock or generally difficult to sell. These albums would often be available for mere pennies, so he could mark up the price massively while still being able to undercut many of the leading retailers of the time.

Buy low and sell high; it doesn’t get much simpler than that!

Save the World… and Do it for the Money!

While we’re on the topic of Richard Branson, it is worth mentioning the Virgin Earth Challenge.

The challenge was launched in 2007 as a means of encouraging the development of a “commercially viable design which results in the net removal of anthropogenic, atmospheric greenhouse gases so as to contribute materially to the stability of the Earth’s climate system.”

Although it is now closed, the prize for this challenge was an astounding $25 million.

What is interesting is that there are still plenty of challenges launched on a regular basis relating to environmental factors, and climate change in particular.

Anthropogenic or man-made global warming is a serious ongoing issue for all of us, so if you can come up with some kind of solution you might just strike it rich in the process.

I Can Has Millions?

Anyone who has spent more than five minutes on the Internet will be more than familiar with the swarm of cat pictures and cat-related memes that are found on just about every social media platform.

Memes have become one of the most popular forms of humour both offline and online, and we have a chap by the name of Erik Nakagawa to largely thank for this.

Nakagawa was a software developer who decided to get out of his occupation and create ICanHasCheezburger.com

This website quickly grew into a large network of blogs for subsequently being sold for $2 million.

The value of the Cheezburger network continues to increase year on year, which isn’t bad for an enterprise founded on little more than cute pictures!

From Cats to… Rocks?!

As if there is one already bizarre enough with cardboard boxes and cats, we have perhaps one of the most ingenious uses of advertising ever conceived.

In the United States in 1975, a man named Gary Dahl came up with the idea for, wait for it, the pet rock.

This invention of sorts brought in many millions of dollars, relying simply on plain old rocks that were sold at $3.95 apiece.

Dahl made a total of $56 million selling rocks that he had procured from a construction firm, selling them with little more than modestly decorated packaging and a brief manual for owners.

So the next time you find yourself pondering how to make a few bucks, you might want to try thinking outside of the box.

Whether you want to save the world or convince people to buy nicely packaged stones, there is an almost limitless number of ways for you to stake your claim, find your fame, and make like a bandit!