This divergence showed up inside our open positions

Today's market and our positions

SPY has had a rough stretch, and we're not going to paper over it. The market ground lower for most of our 16-day window — that's just the tape we've been trading. So let's look at the numbers honestly. The system sits at -0.7%. SPY over the same window: -1.3%. That's +0.6% alpha — not a victory lap, just what the scoreboard shows. No trades closed today. What we have instead are two open positions doing completely different things, which turns out to be a decent stress test of how the Relative Strength Engine behaves when the market refuses to cooperate.

What our open trades are doing

EVC is the one that's earning its keep. Day 9, entered at $9.05, now sitting at $9.86 — that's +8.95% on the position while SPY managed +1.22% over the same stretch. The Relative Strength Engine flagged this one because it was already pulling away from the index before we stepped in, and it's held that separation ever since. Nothing about this setup has changed in a way that concerns us. PIII is a different story entirely. Day 5, entered at $12.81, now at $10.75. That's -16.08% on the position against SPY's -1.07% over the same window — a -15.01% alpha gap, and not the kind you want. The Relative Strength Engine expected this name to hold its edge when the market pulled back. It hasn't. The system still has it open, but a position losing this much relative ground this fast is one we want to understand clearly before tomorrow's session opens.

Today's closed trades, post-mortem

No trades closed today, so there's no post-mortem to run. The scoreboard stays where it is: 2 wins out of 3 closed trades, a 67% win rate. PIII is the position that could move that math if it doesn't stabilize. Worth saying plainly: the one closed loss we've had is part of why the system-level number is in the red. That's how this works — wins and losses both go on the board, and we report both.

What could change by tomorrow's open

The position to watch into tomorrow's open is PIII. Down 16% in five days and lagging the index by 15 points, it's carrying real weight on the portfolio right now. If the market opens weak again and PIII doesn't hold, that spread could widen further before the system triggers an exit. EVC is the offset — it's been resilient — but a strong position doesn't cancel out a deteriorating one. It just softens the damage. Keep an eye on whether the broader tape finds its footing overnight. Both open positions sit inside the Relative Strength Engine, which needs the index to cooperate at least somewhat for that alpha gap to start closing.

What we're watching tomorrow

Tomorrow morning the engines scan fresh. Whether PIII stabilizes or keeps sliding will shape how we think about new entries — there's a real difference between adding exposure when one position is struggling and adding it when the book is clean. The morning scan will tell us exactly which situation we're walking into.