Three follow-ups to the cold-start floor fix:
1. Kernel: MIN_TRADES_FOR_VAR_CAP gate. After the first trade closed,
`isv_kelly_update_on_close` set `realised_return_var = ret²` — a
single-sample variance proxy that systematically collapses
`cap_units = target_vol / sqrt(var × ann_factor)` near zero for
any biased return. cap_lots → 0 → no further trades despite strong
alpha. Gate the variance-derived cap behind `n_trades_seen >= 10`;
below the threshold cap falls back to host-supplied `max_lots`,
same as the pre-first-trade path. Same gate applied to both
`decision_policy_default` and `decision_policy_program`.
Regression: `post_first_loss_state_does_not_lock_out_further_trades`
reproduces the exact pre-fix state from the smoke (n_trades_seen=1,
var=103.6) and asserts the kernel still fires a long with p=0.8.
2. Aggregate: add `nvidia.com/gpu: 1` resource request. Scaleway's
L40S device plugin mounts libcuda.so.1 into the container only on
GPU-requesting pods; the aggregate logic is CPU-only but the
binary's dynamic loader needs the driver libs. Cheapest correct
fix until a separate CPU-only aggregator binary exists.
3. Smoke YAML: `max_events: 0` (exhaust loader). 100k events is
minutes of ES.FUT, far shorter than the h6000 holding horizon the
model was trained on. Full quarter exercises sustained trading +
variance estimate ramp-up.
All three regression tests pass locally on RTX 3050 Ti.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.7 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>