Checklist · Appendix D
Readiness Checklist Twenty-one items. Five categories. The minimum infrastructure required to run the framework at all.
The checklist below is the minimum infrastructure required to operate this framework. Every item on it represents a dependency, a component whose absence degrades the framework from a systematic process into a discretionary guess. Work through it once before your first paper trading session and verify nothing has changed before your first live session.
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Account and Access Brokerage account active with SPX options trading enabled. SPX and XSP index options require specific approval from your broker. Confirm your account is approved before assuming you can trade. Approval is not automatic.Options approval level confirmed. The framework’s structures (iron condors, bull put and bear call verticals, and bull call and bear put debit spreads) require spread-level options approval (Level 3 at Webull) plus a margin account plus $2,000 minimum equity, all three concurrently (Chapter 23, Section 4). Most brokers do not allow spreads in a cash account; a trader without a margin account paper trades until one is in place. Confirm that your account configuration matches the trades planned for the session.Funding confirmed and settled. ACH transfers typically settle in 2–5 business days. Wire transfers settle same day or next day depending on the institution. Some brokers extend instant buying power before an ACH deposit settles (Webull’s covers stocks and ETFs), so do not count on options buying power until the funds have settled. Confirm your available balance before your first session.Day-trade rule status known. FINRA retired the Pattern Day Trader rule effective June 4, 2026, but brokers may phase the change in through October 20, 2027. Confirm which regime your broker runs; if it still runs the legacy day-trade budget, the framework’s reserve rule applies (Chapter 23, Section 4).Data Infrastructure Barchart Premier subscription active. Navigate to barchart.com and confirm Premier access. Verify that you can download a CSV from the SPX options chain. If the export button is grayed out or absent, check that your subscription is Premier. Upgrade before proceeding.SPX options chain export tested. Pull a test CSV from the SPX chain with the export set the way the framework uses it: today’s expiration only, volume-weighted (Chapter 4). Open the file and confirm it contains strike prices and associated Greeks fields. If the file is empty, malformed, or contains only summary data, the workflow will not function. Resolve before your first session.Real-time options chain data (OPRA) active on your trading platform. Live options chain data—real-time bid, ask, and last for SPX options—usually carries a small monthly fee, waived on Webull in a month with at least one options trade; paper mode submits no order, so expect to pay it while you paper trade (Chapter 6). Confirm your platform is displaying live chain data, not 15-minute delayed data. Delayed chain data makes 0DTE execution management unreliable.ES futures chart accessible—overnight reference and VWAP. The ES 5-minute overnight chart gives the overnight high, low, and VWAP as your reference for the open; it is not a Premarket Setup input, and a delayed feed is adequate for it. The ES chart also serves as a live intraday reference throughout the session: VWAP holds and reclaims, intraday range development, and momentum shifts in ES inform position management. The fade entry’s ES VWAP confirmation needs a current read, so confirm you have real-time ES from your broker or a real-time futures data subscription before your first session.ES futures data subscription and approval confirmed. Accessing real-time ES futures data requires both subscription access and, on some platforms, futures account approval, a separate authorization from options approval. Confirm with your broker whether real-time ES data requires a separate exchange fee subscription (common on most retail platforms at a low monthly cost), and whether viewing or referencing futures data requires futures trading approval on your account. This is a platform permission issue, not a margin or risk issue. Resolve it before your first session. If your broker does not offer real-time ES, TradingView’s CME Group futures data provides it on a paid plan; for the overnight reference alone, TradingView’s free delayed feed is enough.AI Workflow AI assistant access confirmed. Confirm you have an active subscription to a capable AI assistant and that the interface is accessible from your trading workstation. The framework’s six prompts were built and tested on Claude. If you are using a different AI platform, re-validate: confirm through the Session Framework Load that the rules come back intact, and check early outputs against the source data before relying on them.Premarket Setup prompt tested with a real CSV. Load a prior session’s SPX chain CSV into your AI assistant using the Premarket Setup prompt from Appendix A, in a chat the Session Framework Load (Prompt 6) has already loaded. Confirm the output is a complete GEX Suite that compiles in the Pine Editor and draws the expected levels, or a valid WebullScript build for traders who chart on Webull. If the output is malformed, missing sections, or contains syntax errors, resolve the prompt configuration before your first paper session.All six framework prompts reviewed and accessible. The Premarket Setup, Intraday Update, Trade Setup Evaluation, Position Monitor, EOD Post-Mortem, and Session Framework Load prompts should be saved in a location you can access quickly during the session. Chapter 11 covers each prompt in full. Appendix A contains the copy-paste versions.Trading Discipline Paper trading mode active. Until your paper record shows positive expectancy after fees and slippage across at least forty sessions and thirty closed trades, with a drawdown that never exceeded 6R (six planned losses) from its high, you are not ready for live capital; a breach of 6R restarts the count, with the paper rows up to and including the breaching session set aside and every gate measure starting again from the first session after it, and a failed discipline record pauses it (Chapter 23, Section 2). Log every stop-out at its actual fill, slippage included, never at the mid. Chapter 23, Section 2 sets the gate; Chapter 22 covers the paper trading protocol. This is not a formality.Sizing table read. Before the first live session, find your account size in the sizing table (Chapter 23, Section 4) and note the instrument (XSP or SPX), the standard contract count, the session budget (1–2% of equity, set before the session and shared by every entry in it), and the EM tiers that adjust the count (under 0.30% of spot at the open, at most 1 contract and no debit entry, and premium that thin often fails the credit minimum; above 0.75%, half the table). The mark stop (close when the spread’s mark reaches three times the credit, a loss of two times the credit; Chapter 18) is set at every standard entry; a fade is sized on its maximum loss instead (Chapter 17), and a debit spread on its debit (Chapter 15).Trading journal active. Every session, paper or live, should be logged. The journal structure covered in Chapter 20 captures entry criteria, exit execution, and post-mortem analysis. A session without a journal entry is a session that cannot be learned from.Macro calendar checked for the session ahead. Tier 1 events—FOMC decisions, NFP releases, CPI prints—suspend the framework entirely. Tier 2 events require a 45–60-minute post-print pause (about 90 minutes for Core PCE) with re-validation before resumption (ATR(5) compression, dominant nodes in place on a new print, EM consumption readable). Chapter 21 covers the calendar tier system. Early-close days (1:00 PM closes) are not traded, and no entry is taken in the 30 minutes before a scheduled 10:00 or 2:00 print; monthly options-expiration Fridays, quarter-end, and VIX-expiration days run normally and are noted in the journal. Check the calendar the evening before every session, and confirm it again in the Premarket Setup.Framework rules reviewed. Before your first live session, read Chapters 15 through 18 in sequence: structure selection, the three-signal entry rule, the fade entry variant, and trade management and exits. The exit rules, including the 2:30 PM soft stop and the 3:00 PM hard cutoff, are not optional components. They exist because the trades that blow up frameworks are almost always the trades where the exit rule was suspended for a reason that seemed good at the time.