Mustard Seed

Fun fact: mustard seeds are the Rocky of tree-seeds. Mustard seeds are suuuuuper tiny, and they create really, really big trees, sometimes even against the odds of bad conditions. AKA: The Cinderella Story Seed.

This is how the economic term “mustard seed” got its name. A mustard seed in economics refers to a small event that could trigger a huge one—in particular, economic recovery after a recession. Mustard seeds are small events that have the power to turn a bear market into a bull market, unsuspectingly.

A classic example of a mustard seed is something unexpected that causes consumer confidence to rise when things seem bad. Identifying mustard seeds is much easier in retrospect than it is when they’re still growing. But hey, we try.