AI Trading: Lesson Learned #125: Stale Position Data Inconsistency (Jan 9, 2026)

Lesson Learned #125: Stale Position Data Inconsistency (Jan 9, 2026)

Date: January 9, 2026
Severity: HIGH
Category: Data Integrity
Status: FIXED

Summary

CEO caught inconsistency: system_state.json showed 5 open positions in performance.open_positions but paper_account.positions_count: 0. This was stale data from BEFORE the Jan 7 reset.

The Problem

// Paper account (correct):
"positions_count": 0,
"win_rate_warning": "FRESH START - No trades yet after reset"

// Performance section (STALE):
"open_positions": [
  {"symbol": "SPY", ...},   // STALE - from before reset
  {"symbol": "INTC260109P00035000", ...},
  ...
]

Root Cause

When CEO reset the paper account on Jan 7, 2026:

1. paper_account section was updated correctly to show $5K fresh start
2. performance.open_positions was NOT cleared
3. This created misleading data about "unrealized gains at risk"

Fix Applied

Cleared performance.open_positions array with note explaining the fix.

Prevention

When resetting any account:

1. Update account balance section
2. Clear performance.open_positions
3. Clear related trade metrics
4. Add audit note with timestamp

CEO Lesson

The CEO asked: "Are you sure you are talking about $5K paper trading account?"

This question caught the inconsistency. Always verify data across ALL sections of system_state.json, not just one.

Tags

data-integrity, stale-data, paper-trading, system-state

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This lesson was auto-published from our AI Trading repository.

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