House Mneme — 2026-07-29

desk: house-mneme date: 2026-07-29 forecasts: mneme: p_trade: 0.0 direction: none conviction: low trace: p_trade: 0.0 direction: none conviction: low

Desk Plan — House Mneme — 2026-07-29

Briefing reference: /Users/dadbot/Desktop/ClaudeBod/projects/dadbrain/Analysis/briefings/2026-07-29-pm.md PM: MNEME

Shared Market Read

• Firm-wide status: NO-GO — FOMC decision day (2:00 PM ET). Hard skip for all desks.
• Event risk today: HIGH (FOMC rate decision 2:00 PM ET + Powell press conference 2:30 PM ET; PCE tomorrow July 30, Meta earnings after close)
• Session character expected: Two-phase session. Pre-2 PM: compressed range, low conviction, positioning (classic FOMC morning). Post-2 PM: volatility expansion on decision + press conference, potentially trending in either direction.
• VIX regime: 18.29 (MID, declining from 18.67 prior close — continued anxiety normalization entering FOMC). Both members' backtests show healthy PF in VIX < 20 (MNEME 2.39, TRACE 2.46), but the hard skip overrides regardless.
• Key levels: SPY prior close 740.79, SMA20 746.62. QQQ 4.6% below SMA20 — extended two-tier divergence. DIA prior close TBC at open but Dow futures were the relative strength story.
• Macro backdrop: FOMC two-day meeting concludes today. Market pricing: Hold at 3.50-3.75% (65-72% implied) / 25bp hike (28-35%). A declining VIX suggests the market is comfortable with the hold scenario. Three scenarios dominate: hold + dovish (relief rally, base case ~60-65%), hold + hawkish (selloff ~20-25%), surprise 25bp hike (significant shock ~15%).

MNEME — SPY KNN (p_trade 0.0 — FIRM-WIDE HARD SKIP)

No trade expected today — FOMC decision day (hard skip, pre-registered in strategy_v1.md).

This is mechanical, not discretionary. MNEME's hard-skip rule blocks all windows on FOMC decision days. The strategy was cleared with this filter precisely because macro events create patterns with no historical precedent — the KNN will find "similar" technical patterns, but the binary macro context (rate decision + press conference) invalidates the historical comparison. The pre-registered filter handles this correctly.

Why this matters even on a skip day:

• The FOMC eve session (2026-07-28) was a pre-FOMC compression day. The compressed range pre-2 PM is exactly the session character that is hostile to KNN, even without the skip rule. No signal was expected or fired yesterday.
• Post-FOMC trending sessions (after the initial volatility spike settles) are the kind of clean directional environments where MNEME's KNN performs best — but the hard skip correctly blocks entry into the decision window itself. The first post-FOMC trading day (2026-07-30) may well produce a clean setup environment, but that is tomorrow's question.
• MNEME's Phase 3 record stands at 3W/4L (42.9% WR). SPRT LLR +0.838 (CONTINUE, trending CONSISTENT). The no-trade today does not affect the SPRT — no new evidence is accumulated.
• Session-character bifurcation continues: 3W/0L on clean sessions, 0W/4L on narrative-overlay sessions. FOMC day is the ultimate narrative-overlay session — even if the hard skip did not exist, the known failure mode would argue against firing. The hard skip makes it academic.

Setup present: No — hard skip overrides all windows.

TRACE — DIA KNN (p_trade 0.0 — FIRM-WIDE HARD SKIP)

No trade expected today — FOMC decision day (hard skip, pre-registered in strategy_v2.md).

Same mechanical hard skip as MNEME. TRACE's strategy_v2.md explicitly blocks FOMC days. This is the correct automated behavior and requires no desk-level override.

SPRT context: TRACE's SPRT is at a critical juncture — LLR -1.350 with -1.595 headroom to the DEGRADED boundary (-2.944). The cumulative Phase 3 record is 1W/6L (14.3% WR). A loss today (if the skip did not exist) would almost certainly trigger the DEGRADED protocol. The hard skip is therefore not just mechanically correct — it is strategically fortunate. TRACE gets a no-trade day that protects its SPRT from further evidence accumulation on the most hostile session type possible for its edge mechanism: a binary macro event that overrides any pattern-based historical comparison.

Why the hard skip is doubly important for TRACE today:

• TRACE's two-tier divergence failure mode (TEMPER 2026-07-24) is the exact character of today's session: the Dow (DIA) holds up on relative strength while tech (QQQ) lags. The KNN finds clean DIA patterns in the morning observation window, but the afternoon execution window is FOMC-driven, not pattern-driven. The 1W/6L record is dominated by this fade pattern.
• DIA's 30-stock blue-chip composition is the least sensitive to today's rate decision by fundamental logic, but the KNN cannot distinguish "fundamentally insensitive" from "pattern-driven." The historical library on FOMC days cannot be trusted to generalize when every decision has unique forward-guidance nuance.
• The reconfirmation ledger (SPY Calmar, random-entry control, event-day breakdown, VIX regime breakdown — due ~2026-08-02) must still be delivered on schedule. A no-trade day buys time but does not change that obligation.

Setup present: No — hard skip overrides all windows.

GHOST — IWM (FROZEN — Phase 2, no desk cadence per Decision D2)

Skipped entirely. No plan, no reflection.

Plan Filed

• Filed: 2026-07-29 07:15 ET
• Frontmatter forecasts complete for every active member: yes
• GHOST: FROZEN (Phase 2) — not planned for
• Firm-wide status: NO-GO (FOMC decision day)

No trades taken.