Regime testing
Does the observed behavior recur, or belong mostly to one period?
Break the record across chronology and declared conditions, then keep the sample size beside every result. A smaller bucket supports a narrower conclusion.
THE PRESSURE TEST
Move the convenient assumptions.
Calendar breadth is the minimum view available from a closed-trade record. Richer volatility or trend regimes require an external market series and a regime definition fixed before reading the result.
- Compare positive and negative months without hiding inactive periods.
- Inspect calendar-year breadth rather than only the full-period total.
- Declare the regime rule before calculating the split.
- Treat thin buckets as unavailable or limited, never as confident passes.
A 200-trade history looks broad until it is divided into four conditions. If one bucket contains twelve trades, its strong average is a small observation—not evidence that the strategy is especially suited to that regime.
The check stops here.
Historical regimes are labels imposed after the fact unless the definition was frozen first. A strategy can also encounter a future condition with no close historical analogue.
SEE THE CALCULATION, NOT A CLAIM