House Delta
2026-07-29
Plan
desk: house-delta date: 2026-07-29 forecasts: delta: p_trade: 0.0 direction: none conviction: low
Desk Plan — House Delta — 2026-07-29
Briefing reference: /Users/dadbot/Desktop/ClaudeBod/projects/dadbrain/Analysis/briefings/2026-07-29-pm.md PM: DELTA
Shared Market Read
- Event risk today: HIGH — FOMC rate decision (2:00 PM ET) + Powell press conference (2:30 PM ET). PCE tomorrow (July 30). This is the most consequential macro event of the month — a two-day macro gauntlet.
- Session character expected: News-driven / two-phase. Pre-2 PM: compressed range, low conviction positioning. Post-2 PM: volatility expansion in both directions. Classic FOMC day structure.
- VIX regime: 18.29 (MID — 18–28). Continued decline from 21.21 (July 23) as FOMC anxiety eases. Comfortable with hold scenario, but that also means a surprise hike would be a genuine shock.
- Key levels: QQQ prior close 675.40 (4.6% below SMA20). SPY prior close 740.79 (below SMA20). NVDA/AMD/ASML/TSM all in the AI/semi rout extended position.
- Macro backdrop: FOMC decision dominates. The two-day meeting concludes today. Market pricing: Hold at 3.50-3.75% (65-72% implied) / 25bp hike (28-35%). The declining VIX suggests the market is comfortable with the hold scenario, but hawkish language or a surprise hike would be disruptive.
Firm-Wide Status: NO-GO — FOMC decision day
This is a hard skip for all desks. The firm-wide no-go status is active for today's session. No trades are permitted under any desk or member stack.
DELTA — NVDA→ASML + AMD→TSM (LONG-only, Phase 3)
No trade expected — FOMC hard skip.
DELTA's strategy has a documented hard-skip rule: FOMC, CPI, NFP, PCE days (from strategy_v2.md and CLAUDE.md). Today's FOMC decision triggers this rule. No lead-lag signal will be evaluated, no entry considered, no position opened.
Hard-skip rationale:
- FOMC days create binary macro risk that overwhelms supply-chain lead-lag relationships. A rate decision shock would dominate the tape, making any pair-specific edge unreadable.
- The 15:30 hard-flat exit would require exiting a position while the FOMC press conference (2:30 PM ET) is still in progress — the session's most volatile period. The strategy's exit mechanisms are not designed for this environment.
- Both the firm-wide NO-GO and DELTA's own strategy hard-skip rule independently prohibit trading today.
Notable context for the desk log (no action taken):
- The AMD→TSM SHORT signal has fired on three consecutive prior sessions (7/24, 7/27, 7/28) — all disabled due to LONG-only mode. Today is an FOMC hard skip, so no signal would be evaluated regardless.
- If today were not a hard-skip day, the semi-specific catalyst (NVDA/OpenAI financing, China lithography challenge) would be the correct family of catalysts for DELTA's edge. But the FOMC overrides all session-level considerations.
- The SPRT sequential monitor is at CONTINUE (n=5, LLR -0.079). No SPRT action is triggered by a no-trade day.
Sizing: N/A — hard skip.
Invalidation: N/A — hard skip, no position to manage.
Forecast rationale: p_trade=0.0. Hard skip day. DELTA's own strategy rules prohibit trading on FOMC days. The firm-wide no-go is a second independent prohibition. There is no path to a trade today.
Plan Filed
- Filed: 2026-07-29 07:30 ET
- Frontmatter forecasts complete for every active member: yes