A1-S structure variant (HH/HL trend-join + swing-trail)

The question

Does time-series price trend — multi-asset momentum that rides established up/down-trends and exits on reversal — produce a tradeable, cost- and crowding-honest edge, distinct from the fund's cross-sectional relative-momentum sleeve?

How it was tested

The hypothesis, its exact trigger, the outcome it predicts, and the pass/fail bar were written down and cryptographically hash-locked before any data was tested, then held through a mandatory cooling-off period. The backfill ran exactly once against those frozen parameters — no re-tuning, no curve-fitting — using adversarial statistics (stationary-bootstrap confidence intervals, multiple-testing correction, purged cross-validation with an embargo, and walk-forward out-of-sample splits). The specific trigger thresholds are proprietary and omitted here.

The outcome

RAN 2026-07-12 (attended; the dedicated 9am fire silently no-op'd — the rli-v2-7/09 class — so the weekly optimizer ran it after a 4-lens adversarial pre-run review returned RUN_AS_IS/0-blocking) → NOISE / DISCONFIRMED. 4,858 obs 2007-2026; net Sharpe(ann) -0.20 [boot95 -0.66,-0.28], negative even at 5bps (-0.09), cum net -29.9%, maxDD 42.8%. THE BINDING BAR FAILS DECISIVELY: OOS -0.285 vs A1 baseline 0.142 (Δ -0.427, must STRICTLY beat), folds 0/5, absolute-floor ✗, incremental-to-eq_mom_xs combined 0.003 < xs-alone 0.095 (corr 0.094 orthogonal but value-destroying). Pass bars 1/5 (only every-regime-non-catastrophic ✓). DSR(info,nTrials=37) 15.2%. The operator's HH/HL structure-pullback + swing-trail is WORSE than the Donchian baseline — CLOSES the trend family (A1 INFO/not-a-sleeve + A1-S NOISE; neither liquid-ETF trend construct is a sleeve). Pure info-layer, zero trade-path. data/backfill/a1s_structure_variant_2026-07-13.json. Rule #10: no iterate. — LOCKED 2026-06-30 (operator-directed, immediately after A1). SHA 28f47ebf; inherits A1's resolved decisions (12-ETF / long-short primary + long-flat companion / equal-weight / Donchian-20 baseline). The operator's personal HH/HL style given a falsifiable home — continuation timing, NOT counter-trend (MR guardrail untriggered). Adversarial-by-construction pass bar: must STRICTLY beat A1 net Sharpe OOS (matching = FAILING) + absolute floor + trade-count<15 honesty cap; swing definition carries an explicit confirmation-lag (no look-ahead). SEQUENCED (harness-enforced): may NOT backfill until A1's backfill artifact + verdict memo BOTH exist — backfillEligibleOn 2026-07-12 is the cooling+sequencing buffer, the harness check is the binding gate. Verdict yields AT MOST a MONITOR candidacy (modifier 0, post-7/1). Lock memo project_a1_trend_barbell_lock_2026_06_30.md.

The backfill ran and the hypothesis failed its pre-registered bar. It is recorded and retired — not re-tested without a fresh, separately-registered hypothesis.