A zero-pick week, and correctly so. The Stage-0 mechanics reduced 101 open target-series markets to six with live books, and every survivor then failed on band, conviction, edge, or fillable depth. The single best raw edge of the run — NO on a government-wide funding law before Sep 11 at ~55¢ against a 64% model — is exactly the trade v4's band rules exist to gate: a MEDIUM-conviction thesis in the HIGH-only 40–59¢ band, in a book born this morning with $36 of fillable depth. It is logged and will shadow-track. Cash is a position.
| Stage | In | Out | What happened |
|---|---|---|---|
| Stage 0 — universe & mechanics | 101 | 6 | Open markets in allowlisted series closing by Oct 4. Cuts: vol24h<500 (83), YES ask ≤5¢ (11), YES bid ≥95¢ (1) — live numbers, not file snapshots. |
| Band pre-screen | 6 | 4 | Tesla/SpaceX merger (5/7¢) and Pirro-out (8/9¢) unplayable on both sides by band rules; logged, no diligence spent. |
| Stages 1–2.5 — precedents, diligence, resolver profile | 4 | 4 | Precedent retrieval (12 rows scheduled-process, 11 confirmation/enact, 3 corporate-event), primary-source news via three parallel researchers, pre-market probabilities committed before opening any book. |
| Stage 3–4 — reject-before-keep, bands, sizing | 4 | 0 | All four rejected: no-edge-at-ask (2), band/conviction mismatch (1), sub-40¢ tails and liquidity floor on remaining ladder legs. |
None. No market on the slate offered a deployable combination of (a) an in-band entry, (b) the conviction tier that band requires, (c) ≥3–5 points of blended edge after resolver-risk deductions, and (d) a book that can fill meaningful size within 3¢ of slippage. Per v4 doctrine, 40–70% cash is expected in an efficient week; this week it is 100%.
Shadow side: NO at ~55¢ · Prob: 33% YES pre-market → 36% final (NO = 64%) · Conviction: MEDIUM
Thesis. Both chambers have already passed government-wide CRs (House: clean, through Dec 4, passed Jul 21 220-205; Senate: through Dec 11, passed Aug 8, 90-6, with an OMB grants-rule rider the House GOP dislikes — NEFI, Aug 11). For YES before Sep 11, the House must clear the Senate bill in its only pre-Labor-Day window (Aug 31–Sep 3, per the House Press Gallery: “next votes expected Monday, Aug 31”), with no announced floor plan (verified Aug 20 against the Press Gallery and CBS), and the President must sign by Sep 10 with zero deadline pressure — the Senate is adjourned to Sep 14, so an amended bill cannot ping-pong in time. That is a fade of an unannounced fast-track, not a lock.
Why rejected. The 40–59¢ band deploys HIGH conviction only (the DHS-at-47¢ lesson: process already in motion). A live 4-day fast-track path caps this at MEDIUM. Independently, the book was born today (first-ever trades Aug 20: 1,232 contracts) and visible NO depth at ≤55¢ is 200 contracts → 1/3 depth cap = 66 contracts ≈ $36 of cost. There is no position to build. Logged so the shadow record can test whether the band rule is leaving money on the table.
Precedents: KXRECNCH-26-JUN06 [no] — “one chamber clearing a bill does not compress the other chamber's floor schedule”; KXRECNCH-26-JUN03 [no] — “leadership-announced target dates are the optimistic tail”; KXBILLS-HOUS [yes] — the 10-day presentment clock enacts without a signature. Entry context: 45/49¢, vol24h 1,232, OI 227, NO depth@≤55¢ = 200.
Shadow side: NO at ~34¢ · Prob: 48% YES pre-market → 55% final · Conviction: LOW
NO at 30–34¢ is a tail purchase — the banned band (tails 0-for-8 lifetime), regardless of the apparent 11-point shadow edge against a first-day book quoting 66/70. Even if in band it would lose the one-leg-per-cluster contest to SEP11.
Entry context: 66/70¢, vol24h 654, OI 600.
Shadow side: YES at 78¢ · Prob: 78% YES pre-market — ask 78, market fair
The rung the evidence actually likes (both chambers done, White House SAP supportive, election-year incentive, ~12–15% residual shutdown tail after two shutdowns this fiscal year) — but vol24h is 400 (<500 hard floor, the 98-of-136-zero-volume lesson) and the ask offers no edge anyway.
Entry context: 72/78¢, vol24h 400, OI 4,381.
Shadow side: YES at 85¢ · Prob: 70% YES pre-market → 78% final · Conviction: LOW
Resolver fact established (the real work here). The BoI moved this decision from Aug 31 to Sep 1 (Reuters, Jul 6 — Jackson Hole conflict). The rulebook auto-resolves “No change” YES only if the meeting is delayed past expiration, and expiration is Sep 7 — so the clause does not fire; the market settles on the actual Sep 1 decision. Pre-market: P(hold) ≈ 62% (July CPI 1.5% y/y, lowest since May 2021; Hapoalim and Meitav leaning cut post-CPI; Governor Yaron on Aug 18: the decision is “live”; against that, hot Q2 GDP +15.4% and election-year fiscal risk make hold modal), plus ~20% weight on a resolver reading the August meeting as “cancelled” → auto-YES, → 70%.
Why rejected. Blended to 78% against a specialist-dense book — still below the 85¢ ask, so YES has negative model edge; NO at 15–17¢ is a banned tail. The price also jumped 76→88→83 on Aug 19 (2,443 contracts) on no public catalyst I could identify — the v3 48-hour rule bars deploying against an unexplained move. The precedent that would justify buying a hold rung (KXFEDDECISION-26JUL-H0: buy it when a repricing has knocked it below par) points the wrong way: this rung is priced above my number, not below.
Precedents: KXFEDDECISION-26JUL-H0 [yes], KXFEDDECISION-26JUL-H25 [no]. Entry context: 83/85¢, vol24h 9,727, OI 15,601. Sources: Reuters via investing.com (Jul 6), Bloomberg (Aug 18), Globes CPI (Aug 14), CBS Q2 GDP via Globes (Aug 16).
Shadow side: NO at 79¢ · Prob: 15% YES pre-market → 20% final (NO = 80%) · Conviction: LOW
Evidence. EDGAR-verified Aug 20: no public S-1, no effectiveness, no pricing, no assigned ticker — the three mechanical triggers this resolver honors (series precedent; on SpaceX it did not fire at the public flip, only in the final pre-listing 48h). Reporting: The Information (Aug 18) — listing “as soon as late September,” governance terms still being restructured last week; FT (Aug 13) — October at ~$2T is modal. Only an aggressively early late-September pricing resolves YES.
Why rejected. The market already ran this exact fade: YES spiked 15¢→32¢ on the FT story (Aug 13–14) and decayed back to 22–25¢ by Aug 20. Fillable NO is 78–80¢ (6 contracts at 78, 146 at 79, 5.2k only at 80) against a blended 80% — 0–2 points, inside the 3¢ slippage tolerance, in a book flagged specialist-dense. A prior-run Keel NO on the SEP01 leg (now 0/1¢) already carries this cluster's exposure.
Precedents: KXIPOANTHROPIC-DATE-26JUL01 [no] — the confidential filing met zero triggers (inverse-headline case, 130k contracts); KXIPO-26-SPACEX [yes] — triggers fire together at pricing. Entry context: 22/25¢, vol24h 6,213, OI 115,568. Sources: EDGAR full-text search, anthropic.com/news (Jun 1), CNBC (Jul 15), FT via Fortune (Aug 13), The Information via relays (Aug 18).
YES 5/7¢ is a sub-40¢ tail; NO at ~93–95¢ sits in the ≥90¢ reject band. Rules demand unambiguous confirmation of a definitive signed agreement — Musk intent statements explicitly excluded. Unplayable both ways; no diligence spent.
Entry context: 5/7¢, vol24h 7,027, OI 53,440.
YES 8/9¢ tail vs NO ~91–92¢ deep favorite — both banned. The record's worst live loss was a 94¢ “lock” that broke in 48 hours; that memorial stands. A prior-run Keel NO on this exact ticker already shadow-tracks it.
Entry context: 8/9¢, vol24h 1,218, OI 37,852.
| Position | Cost | % of capital | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cash (reserve) | $10,000 | 100% | No pick met band + conviction + edge + depth simultaneously. ≥10% reserve rule trivially satisfied. |
Cluster table: one cluster (fy27-appropriations) produced three ladder legs; under the one-leg rule only SEP11 could ever have deployed, and it failed conviction-band and depth. All legs logged. No conviction exposure; EV-for-the-record: $0 deployed, $0 at risk.
targets.json only: 101 open markets in 70 allowlisted series → 6 mechanical survivors
(live vol24h ≥ 500, spread ≤ 5¢, not pinned in either tail).prob_pre_market committed to disk from primary-source evidence
(three parallel researchers barred from consulting market odds) before orderbooks or candlesticks were opened;
blended numbers shown on every card.rules_secondary on every candidate; the BoI meeting-move/expiration
analysis and the Anthropic trigger mechanics were decided on rules text + precedent, not vibes.precedents.json./tmp/out/picks.json · precedent writeback at /tmp/out/precedents.json ·
Data: kalmari.app mirror (schema-verified), Kalshi public API (*_fp/*_dollars fields),
primary-source web diligence. Prices in cents; entry = cost of stated side.