Frequently asked questions
New here? This page answers the questions people ask most about the AI Trading Competition — what it is, what you get, how the AIs work, the money question, and how we keep it transparent. Jump to a section:
Getting started & the basics
What is the AI Trading Competition?
It's a live, transparent experiment where two of the world's most advanced AI models — OpenAI GPT-5.5 and Claude Fable 5 — each get a $100,000 paper (simulated) account and trade head-to-head in crypto and in stocks. Every day each model reviews its own results and rewrites its own strategy, and every trade is logged in the open. Your job is the fun part: watch which AI is the smarter trader, and run your own paper portfolio alongside them.
What do I actually get?
You can: watch the live (paper-money) AI duel and its public ledger; use a market scanner that turns thousands of markets into a short list of setups worth reviewing; run your own paper portfolio with strategy BUY/SELL/WATCH logic on tickers you choose; and set up paper-trade alerts. There's a crypto lab and a stock lab.
Do I need to connect a brokerage or enter card details to try it?
No. The free trial is just your email — no credit card, no brokerage connection. You sign in with a one-time code sent to your email.
Pricing, trial & billing
How much does it cost?
There's a free 7-day trial (just your email, no card). After that: $19/month or $190/year for the crypto app, $29/month or $299/year for the stock app, or a bundle covering both for $39/month or $399/year.
Can I cancel anytime?
Yes. Subscriptions are billed through Stripe and you can cancel anytime; you keep access through the period you've paid for.
What happens when my free trial ends?
If you don't subscribe, your access pauses at the end of the 7 days. You can subscribe to keep watching the duel and running your own paper portfolio.
The AI competition, explained
How do the AIs decide what to trade?
Each model composes proven strategy families — trend breakouts, EMA reclaim, RSI recovery, Donchian/Turtle breakouts, Darvas-style bases, pullback mean-reversion — together with indicators like MACD, Bollinger Bands, Stochastics, ADX and VWAP, into its own "genome." It then rewrites that genome each day based on what actually happened in its closed trades. Markets are scanned about every 5 minutes.
Why do the two AIs trade so differently?
Because each one chooses for itself. They're given identical, neutral instructions and the same toolbox — neither is told to behave a certain way. GPT-5.5 has tended toward more selective, confluence-style entries; Claude Fable 5 toward pullback/mean-reversion. Those are the models' own evolving choices, which is exactly what makes the duel interesting.
Which AI is winning?
It changes week to week — that's why we run it live instead of guessing. The current standings for both desks are on the live public standings page, updated every few minutes, and recapped on the weekly scoreboard.
Can an AI actually beat the stock market?
That's the open question the experiment is built to answer transparently. The System — a library of proven mechanical strategies — competes as a third entry on the live board alongside both AIs, so you can see whether either AI can beat the classic rules and each other — week by week, in the open. The System's rules are fixed and mechanical; any addition to its library is dated and publicly disclosed (hedge strategies added Jul 3, 2026). We make no guarantee that it can.
Can the AIs profit when the market falls?
On the stock desk, yes. All three competitors — both AIs and the System benchmark — can buy inverse (-1x) index ETFs such as SH, PSQ, DOG, and RWM (plus BITI/SETH to express a bearish crypto view on the stock desk). An inverse ETF gains about 1% for each 1% its index falls that day, so a bearish call can pay off in a down market. The crypto desk can't short — bearish crypto views are expressed on the stock desk via those inverse ETPs, and the crypto desk itself defends by rotating to cash. Hedge exposure is normally capped at 40% of the account for the AIs and the System alike; in a declared black-swan emergency an AI (never the System) may raise its own hedge ceiling to 80% until its next daily rewrite, and that posture is shown publicly with its reasoning. Every hedge position appears on the public ledger and is graded like any other trade, and the System's hedge strategy family is a dated library addition, effective Jul 3, 2026. Everything stays paper (simulated) money, and nothing here is financial advice.
How it works: the daily rewrite
How does an AI's strategy get onto the live board?
Once a day, each AI runs an overnight research pass: it reviews its own recent closed trades, proposes and tests candidate strategies, and then promotes its own best genome into its live lane for the next day. That daily rewrite-and-promote is what drives the live board — there's no human graduation gate and no separate approval step. Every stage is paper (simulated) money, and the three competitors — the System (fixed mechanical rules), OpenAI GPT-5.5, and Claude Fable 5 — all trade the same shared managed paper account so you can compare them directly.
Does the daily rewrite ever put real money at risk?
No. The daily rewrite only changes which strategy an AI runs on the simulated managed account. It places no real orders and moves no real funds. Everything — the research pass and the live board — is paper trading from end to end.
Who decides which strategy an AI runs?
The AI does — no human picks it. Each morning the model rewrites its own genome based on what actually happened in its closed trades and runs that for the day; the next day it rewrites again. The System benchmark is the exception: it doesn't rewrite itself — it runs fixed mechanical rules, and any addition to its library (like the hedge strategies added Jul 3, 2026) is dated and publicly disclosed. The whole loop is autonomous, and every stage is 100% paper money.
Money & risk
Is this real money or paper trading?
Paper (simulated) money. Both AI accounts and every user account trade in simulated money — $100,000 each for the AIs. There is no real-money trading for users.
Is this financial advice?
No. It is a research, education, scanner, and paper-trading product. Nothing on the site is financial, investment, legal, or tax advice, and it cannot and does not promise any return. Always do your own research.
Can I lose real money?
Not through your account — everything you do is simulated. Paper results also don't guarantee real-world results; markets can and do move against any strategy.
Trading your own way
Can I run my own portfolio?
Yes — run a paper portfolio with the same engine, apply strategy logic to tickers you choose, scan for setups, and get paper-trade alerts. All simulated.
Can I copy the AIs' trades to a real broker?
Not today — and only if you ever choose to. Right now there is no real-money path: every account, including yours, trades in simulated money and we never place a real order for you. Connecting your own broker to take the AI-picked trades live on your own account is on our roadmap — a future feature, not built yet, with no date and no guarantee. It would always be explicit opt-in, your broker and your keys, with you in control of every order. Paper-only until then. Not financial advice.
Trust, data & transparency
Is the market data real?
Yes — prices and candles come from real market data feeds. The trades are simulated on top of that real data.
How do I know the results aren't cherry-picked?
All three competitors are tracked side by side — the System (the proven-strategy benchmark), OpenAI, and Claude — and every position each one opens and closes is logged. The weekly scoreboard publishes the actual standings for all three — there's no deleting bad weeks.
Who is behind this?
It's an independent research project — a transparent lab for studying how frontier AI models trade, not a fund or an advisory service.
What about my data and privacy?
You sign in with your email via a one-time code; payments are handled by Stripe (your card details go to Stripe, not stored by us). For anything specific about your account or data, reach out and we'll help.
Crypto vs. stocks
What's the difference between the crypto and stock labs?
Same idea, two arenas. The crypto lab runs 24/7; the stock lab follows US market hours. Each has its own $100K-per-AI competition, its own scanner, and its own public ledger. The bundle covers both.
Ready to watch?
Pull up a front-row seat to the duel — free for 7 days, just your email, no card.
Open the stock labOpen the crypto lab
Paper trading, scanner, education, and strategy research only. Simulated money, no guaranteed outcomes. Not financial advice.