This is the single most literal expression of 'downfall of Europe, take the money to Japan' — sell the euro, buy the yen. A European collapse craters the euro on redenomination and capital-flight fears while global money stampedes into the yen as the ultimate Asian safe haven, so this one pair captures both legs of the thesis at once. At the extreme leverage you describe it is the highest-octane way to play it.

Banks are the epicenter of any European financial collapse — they carry the sovereign debt, the leverage, and the interbank contagion. Buying puts on European financials (iShares MSCI Europe Financials, EUFN) or the Euro Stoxx Banks index is the sharpest, most convex way to bet the banking system is where 'bankrupt Europe' literally happens. Puts give you defined risk with explosive payoff if the sector gaps down.

Deutsche Bank is the canary — the most systemically fragile globally-important European lender, the name markets price first when they smell European financial stress. Puts on DB are the single-name, maximum-convexity expression of continental banking failure. If Europe truly goes down, this is one of the first dominoes and the payoff is asymmetric.

A cleaner, no-margin-call way to short the whole continent: EPV delivers -2x the daily return of European large-caps. It profits directly as the broad European equity market collapses, without you managing an FX or futures margin account. The 2x daily reset makes it powerful in a fast, sustained decline.