Bloomberg Risk Takers (2011 - 2012)

College-dropout David Neeleman has changed the way we fly. Best known as the founder of JetBlue, he invented ticketless air travel and revolutionized the industry. Neeleman was fired from Jet Blue amidst controversy in 2007 but he has since gone on to greater heights, launching Azul airlines in Brazil.

Few predicted the real-estate crash; many in the financial world helped blow up the bubble. But Michael Burry saw the danger and figured out a way to bet against it. When the US economy collapsed, he and his investors made nearly a billion dollars shorting the mortgage market with credit default swaps. A central figure in Michael Lewis's best-selling book The Big Short, Michael Burry may be one of the smartest investors of our time.