Replacement policy: emergencies, strikes and the sticky basket

Replacement is rule-based, not a leaderboard race

A drawdown is not evidence of a broken edge, and a rival wallet posting a better week is not evidence that the current leader should leave. A system that reshuffles on relative rank alone is guaranteed to sell exactly the traders it should hold and chase whoever happened to have a good stretch.

So membership in the Elite Top 10 is sticky by design. Score ranks candidates and sets weight; it does not, by itself, end anyone's membership. Only a defined emergency trigger or an accumulation of soft-issue strikes does that.

Emergency removal is immediate

Some failures do not deserve a review cycle. A leader is removed the moment either condition is detected, and their sub-account positions are closed as part of that removal.

• Account value falls below roughly $1,000.
• No fill for 96 hours or more, combined with zero trades in the last 7 days.

Soft issues accrue strikes, not instant removal

Ordinary variance is handled patiently. A wallet can trip a soft-issue condition on a given UTC day, but that counts as at most one strike for that day no matter how many conditions it fails or how many times it fails them. Three strike-days trigger replacement; a clean evaluation day resets the strike counter to zero.

• Fewer than 5 trades in 7 days, or 7-day volume under $25,000, or 48 hours or more since the last fill.
• 30-day trading max drawdown above 35%, measured on jump-adjusted equity so deposits and withdrawals are never read as trading losses.
• 30-day PnL-based ROI below -15%.

What happens to open positions at the moment of replacement

Replacement is not a silent switch of who is being watched. The outgoing leader's positions are closed in their sub-account first, and only then is the slot reassigned to a qualified candidate — an active wallet with sufficient account size and, where measurable, roughly 90 or more days of trading history. The sequence matters: leaving a position open under a leader nobody is following would create exposure with no decision-maker attached to it.

The incoming leader does not inherit anything. They start flat in that sleeve and their next signal opens the first position, which means you do not enter their strategy mid-trade at a price they never chose. The consequence, stated honestly, is that closing happens at whatever the market offers at that moment — a replacement executed during a drawdown realises that drawdown rather than waiting for a recovery that may or may not arrive.

• Outgoing positions are closed before the slot is reassigned — no orphaned exposure.
• The incoming leader starts flat and enters on their own next signal.
• Closing realises the current mark; replacement is not a way to avoid a loss already incurred.
• The sub-account is reused, so the number of sleeves stays stable.

Turnover has a price, so the system is deliberately slow on soft signals

Every replacement closes positions and opens new ones, and both sides pay fees and slippage. That is why the policy is fast only on emergencies and deliberately patient everywhere else: a single soft-issue day is not a verdict, the one-strike-per-day cap prevents one bad day from being counted many times over, and three strike-days are required before anything changes.

Past performance is not indicative of future results. Perpetual futures are leveraged instruments and carry a substantial risk of loss, including the loss of your entire position.