Included with the installer

Operating guide

Read this once after you install. Broker keys stay on your computer. ZenCore sells the software. You fund the account it trades.

Capital at risk. This is not financial advice. You can lose the allocation you set. Paper mode is the default. Past performance is not indicative of future results.

1. What the license pays for

Stripe charges a one-time software fee ($49 when the installer is on sale). That money is not a trading deposit. ZenCore does not hold a balance for you, does not accept a bank transfer for trading capital, and cannot withdraw from your broker.

After you install you get:

  • This guide.
  • The app on your computer, where you save a trade-only key. This website does not take the key.
  • The paper population, which is a shared demo book. It is not your broker account.

2. Where your money sits

  1. You pay ZenCore for the software.
  2. You open a broker account in your own name.
  3. You send money from your own bank to that broker, using the broker's deposit instructions.
  4. In the app you set a capped allocation. That is the bankroll the agent may treat as its own. Leave the rest of the broker balance outside that cap.
  5. You create an API key that can trade and cannot withdraw. You paste it into the app on your computer once. The app encrypts it there and does not upload it.

3. Create the key before you open the app

Built-in simulator

Choose this if you are not ready to connect a broker. No key, no bank transfer, no order leaves ZenCore. Use it to learn the dashboard, then switch to Alpaca paper.

Alpaca paper (recommended first broker)

  1. Create an Alpaca account and open the paper trading keys, not the live keys.
  2. Create a new API key. If Alpaca offers a withdrawal or transfer permission, leave it off. The adapter also refuses any transfer, withdraw, margin, borrow, or journal path.
  3. Copy the key id and the secret. Alpaca shows the secret once.
  4. In the app choose Alpaca, leave live opt-in off, paste both values, set the allocation and the drawdown floor, and tick the withdrawals box.
  5. Use “Test paper connection”. That calls Alpaca's account endpoint and does not place an order.

Alpaca is a US broker. If you are in the UK, check Alpaca's own eligibility before you rely on it. This product does not claim a UK bank can fund Alpaca.

Kraken, for UK crypto

  1. Open Kraken in your own name and finish their identity checks.
  2. From your UK bank, send GBP to your Kraken account with Faster Payments. The pounds land at Kraken, not at ZenCore.
  3. Create an API key with trading permission. On Kraken's key screen, leave withdrawals disabled.
  4. Kraken has no paper venue. For practice, stay on the built-in simulator. You can save a Kraken key with live trading left off. Saving does not place an order.
  5. Live orders stay off until you turn on Live trading. That switch defaults to off and is the only control.

Trading 212 practice

Practice only. Turning Live trading on still uses the practice host. The live Trading 212 host is refused.

  1. Open a Trading 212 Invest or Stocks ISA practice account. Other account types are not covered, and orders run in the account's primary currency.
  2. Create an API key that can place orders and read the portfolio. You can restrict that key to an IP address.
  3. In the app choose Trading 212, paste the key and secret, tick that withdrawals are disabled, and press Test connection. That reads the practice account and does not place an order. The live host is not called.

Trading 212 does not publish a quote feed. A practice order takes its price from the simulator, or from another free source. The only price the broker returns is the current price of a share you already hold.

Alpaca live

Use a separate live key, still with withdrawals disabled. Live trading is the switch at the top of the app. It starts off. Turn it on when you want Alpaca live orders, and turn it off to stop the next one. Turning it on does not place an order by itself. A buy is also capped, a daily loss limit applies, and the drawdown floor still flattens through the reaper.

4. What the allocation and the death floor mean

The allocation is the only cash the treasurer is allowed to treat as the agent's balance. Runway is measured in hours, not days: hosting, inference, and the software fee divided by 730 hours.

  • STABLE, more than 24 hours of runway: normal cycle budget and position size.
  • TIGHT, 6 to 24 hours: smaller budget, fewer symbols, smaller positions.
  • CRITICAL, under 6 hours: the smallest budget. The agent is close to the floor.

The death floor is the higher of a small metabolism floor and your drawdown. At a 20% drawdown on a $100 allocation, the floor is $80. A separate reaper, which the agent cannot call, reads equity from the broker. If equity is at or under the floor it revokes the trading key, cancels open orders, flattens positions, and writes an obituary. There is no grace period.

5. What the agent does on a cycle

  1. The treasurer reads the balance and sets the state. Nothing else sees the raw balance.
  2. The prospector scans your symbols with RSI and a trend filter. It emits a hypothesis with the RSI value, the average, the price, and a timestamp. It does not send orders.
  3. The executor may place an order only for a hypothesis from that scan. It does not pick a different trade and it does not move funds.
  4. A code risk hook runs before any order. It denies leverage, margin, borrowing, shorting, withdrawals, transfers, symbols off your list, oversized positions, a daily-loss breach, and too many orders in an hour. A buy larger than $20 is held for review.
  5. The replicator may spawn one child strategy with a $5 paper allocation and exactly one changed parameter, and only when the treasurer says there is surplus, 72 hours of runway, and room under the cap of 10. The replicator does not decide that there is surplus.

6. How to read the dashboard

The public dashboard shows the shared paper population: runway, state, equity, realized P&L, open positions, recent fills, signals, the family tree, and obituaries. A child row names the single field that changed. An obituary names the cause, the equity, the floor, and the kill order. The first step of that order is always revoking keys.

Your broker setup is not printed on that public page. The public page never receives your key.

7. Rotate or remove a key

  1. On the broker site, delete the old key.
  2. Open the app on your computer at http://127.0.0.1:18779/, paste the new trade-only key, and save.
  3. To stop using a broker, switch that screen to the built-in simulator and save. That clears the stored key.

If a key leaks, revoke it at the broker first. ZenCore cannot pull money back, because the key was never allowed to withdraw.

8. When something looks wrong

  • The installer will not start: the marketplace listing stays closed until the zip is published. A license file comes with that download.
  • Alpaca test fails: you pasted a live key while paper is selected, or the key can do more than trade. Create a paper trade-only key and test again.
  • Trading 212 test fails: use a practice key from the demo account. A live-host check is refused and does not place an order.
  • You expected a live fill and nothing happened: your Live trading switch has to be on, a key has to be saved, and the public paper page is not your broker. Saving the form never sends an order by itself. Trading 212 stays on practice.
  • The public population died: that book is the demo. Your allocation is the cap you saved on the form.

9. Keep this

Bookmark /automaton/guide. The public paper page is not your broker. Keys belong in the app on your computer.