With the Motley Full Money Extra, I'm Chris Hill.

What do movie producers, prostitutes, and big waves surfers have in common?

If they're successful, they're all good at managing risk.

It's the central topic of Alison Shrager's book, an economist walks into a brothel and

other unexpected places to understand risk.

There's an economist who profiled a number of people who, in their own way, managed risk

to further their careers, including David Bowie.

That's right, Bowie was one of the most influential musicians of the last 50 years, and he was

an expert at hedging risk.

When we talked last year, Shrager explained how David Bowie turned his song catalog into

a bond.

Bowie was interesting, and that when he was young, just starting out, got his first record

deal, usually what they do is they give you an advance and they own your royalties.

That's actually, it sounds horrible, and this is why musicians always say they're poor,

even when they're successful, but it's actually a fairly good risk trade, because most contracts

are signed, that person will never make money, but they get to keep their advance.

The music company is just taking a long shot, that your royalties will worth anything,

because I'll show they aren't.

But David Bowie, when he was young, he was like, I'm going to make it, and I will take

a smaller advance, and he didn't have much money, and this is, I want to keep my royalties

because I believe I, in that upside, will go to me.

He was right, obviously, he became David Bowie.

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