Warning: You don’t seriously believe this, do you? 
Prologue
There is almost unanimous agreement that we live in an era of innovation, fast change and considerable volatility. This is true in the field of romance, marriage and family. New forms of romantic relationship are emerging. Divorce rate has increased. Financial aspects of life has taken on greater significance.
Despite such trends, financial innovations failed to cater to this area. It is with considerable vision and courage that a group of people, armed with degrees in financial engineering, political engineering and social engineering, decide to enter this field, and revolutionize romantic and domestic relationship through technology and finance.
Marriage Insurance
The idea of marriage insurance is not new; its history traces back to Elizabethan England, but had not been underwritten since. Capitalizing on the improved technology, actuarial techniques and ready availability of statistics, XYZ’s insurance division offers a range of marriage insurance for a wide range of clientele, from the orthodox to the flamboyant. There are two types of marriage insurances: straight policy and reverse policy.
Straight policy is targeted at married couples, and in the event of their divorce, the company will pay the charges and alimony, in return of premium prior to the breakup. Its operation is similar to other insurance operations. However, a major difference is that governments will comprise the majority of customers. Not that governments will engage in marriage, but that countries with low marriage rates can engage the company to offer nationwide coverage and a reasonable per-couple premium rate. This could provide greater incentives for people in such countries to marry.
Reverse policy is targeted at parents and children. The insurance company will offer reduced premium for children’s life insurance in return for children’s promise not to enter marriage and conceive children; failure to do so will result in substantial liquidated damages and a loss of reduced rates. The parents would act as trustees, which is believed to provide strong incentives to prevent their children from engaging in undesirable behavior. In addition to profit-generating activities, the company enhances social welfare.
Securitization of Marrying Agents
Marriage is currently a protracted and time-consuming process, not to say expensive. Business dealings have to be interrupted. Significant value of dowries change hand. Families literally engage in barter. In other words, marriage carries significant transaction cost.
Securitization of marrying agent – the bride and the bridegroom – substantially eliminates transaction cost. A special type of legal person would be created on behalf of the client and be listed in the primary market; in addition to the client, the legal person could incorporate such dowries as shares, houses or cash. Such arrangements could be made well in advance, even before the client’s birth (but after conception). The asset management company also offers various funds instruments for parents to save and invest dowries for their child, and to engage in advertising campaigns.
The legal person could be reconciliated with the marrying agent upon marriage; the dowries would be accordingly transferred and other pre-arranged transactions made. The client could also retain the legal person shall he or she find marriage a convenient but temporary arrangement, for such purposes as tax minimization or other governmental benefits. A secondary market of legal persons is expected to be lively considering such activities. When the client no longer desire to remain associated with his or her existing spouse, he or she could list the legal person on the secondary market.
Relationship Futures and Other Derivatives
Well wishes are well intentioned, but are nothing more than intangibles. So does jealousy arising out of romantic rivalry. With such advanced instruments as marriage swaps and other derivative instruments, such wishes, well or ill alike, could be reduced to material form, to the benefit of couples, well-wishers and ill-wishers.
The XYZ marriage instruments division will underwrite derivative contracts for such wide range of clients. The most basic form of derivatives use married state of a couple as underlying asset. The contract could originate from either the well-wishers or the ill-wishers. It is cash-settlement only, and has no notional value. More sophisticated contracts have such features as pricing points. The wishers could then actually engage materially in backing their wishes through purchase of such instruments. It is the most visible way of supporting or threatening the couple, in line with capitalistic concepts of profit and loss.
A Basket of Spouse(s)
Some people would not want to get married for various reasons: inexperienced and too shy; unwilling to remain committed for a long time; afraid of being cheated; in perpetual search for strategic marriage; and so on. The gospel of diversification will cater to these people well. Although they had no chance of “beating the neighbors“, risk and statistically-significant unhappiness will be eliminated.
The marriage with a basket of spouse(s) serves such diversification effort well. It is not as simple as purchasing a mutual fund, but nevertheless still simple relative to the process of orthodox marriage. An entity call “Special Relationship Vehicle” will be incorporated for the client in need of diversified marriage. The client could choose from a wide variety of baskets, ranging from an all-encompassing basket, in which every kind of people is represented, to the more exotic kinds of profile, such as spendthrifts or even non-humans.
The purchase entitles the client to a timeshare of certain services, such as childbirth and romantic undertakings. However, the client would have to have at least 1.0 unit of the former, or 0.5 hours of the latter, before he or she could redeem the actual commodity. Nevertheless, clients who have preference for such activities could still utilize this instrument as an attractive short-term arrangement while looking for longer-term ones.
Prospects for XYZ
The company faces a very bright future. There is presently no operator in the field in which XYZ desires to operate, nor it anticipates in the immediate future. Liberation and liberalization of mindsets will substantially aid the company’s undertakings. Conservatism of most businesses will afford the company a significant and sustainable competitive advantage. Therefore and in addition to its strong financial capability, the company does not intend to invite external investors, although is willing to engage in join ventures, both with private and public sector operators.
