Sentinel — Position Review (PM)

No announcement ever came. The Jun 30 NPR story was retracted, the Court denied it, and Roberts's end-of-term staff-retirement announcements excluded Alito. July produced zero fresh signals — the conservative-media "summer announcement" tail never fired. With ~10 hours to close, riding the last cent to resolution beats hitting the 99 bid.

Zero Mar-a-Lago trips all month — the club has been seasonally closed since early May, and the Jul 11 Miami World Cup tail never fired. The clincher: the pool-report schedule for Jul 31 — the final day of the window — has Trump at a Camp David cabinet meeting, then departing for Bedminster, NJ for the weekend. Settles tomorrow; hold to resolution.

Hegseth is not just still in the job — he's conspicuously active in it: testified Jul 21 on Iran war costs ($37.5B), launched the Europe force-posture review, and is pushing new grooming/fitness standards this week (Just Security, Jul 30). No scandal-resignation tail. Closes tonight; nothing left to do but settle.

The thesis held — 702 remains lapsed and the recess calendar now makes YES nearly impossible: the Senate leaves ~Aug 7 and returns Sep 14 while the House is out until Aug 31, so no overlapping session window exists before the cutoff. But this is a capital-efficiency exit, not a thesis exit: Jay Clayton was confirmed DNI Jul 29 (51-47) — the exact deal-unlock tail the original audit priced — and the market doesn't settle for another month. Per desk policy, the last 3–4¢ aren't worth 32 days of locked capital plus tail risk. Liquidity: top of book is thin (5 @ 96¢, then 500 @ 95¢) — size fills land ~95¢.