Your responsibilities
Stretus supplies software. The decisions that determine whether you make or lose money are yours, and this page lists them so none of them arrives as a surprise.
Before you build
Establish that you may trade this way. Automated order placement through a broker API may require specific permissions from your broker, and in some jurisdictions specific disclosures. Indian equity algo deployment requires per-strategy broker approval. That is enforced by the platform. Everything else is between you and your broker.
Know what you are trading. The platform will build a strategy on an instrument you do not understand as readily as on one you do. Understanding the instrument's settlement, session, circuit rules, currency and quote unit is yours. Start at Instruments and Markets.
While you build
Read the strategy object before you accept it. The AI shows you the complete assembled strategy (entry, exit, stop, target, sizing, window) before anything runs. Read it. If it does not say what you meant, say so; the builder is designed to be corrected. A strategy you skimmed is a strategy you authored anyway.
Check what the AI assumed. The platform distinguishes values you stated from values it defaulted. A default is a reasonable value, not your value. If risk-per-trade matters to you, state it rather than accepting a default. See How the AI reads your words.
Do not treat a refusal as an obstacle to route around. When the builder says a phrase is ambiguous or not representable, it is telling you the platform cannot express your rule faithfully. Rewording until something compiles can produce a strategy that means something different from what you asked. See AI limitations.
Before you deploy
Set your risk limits. This is the responsibility most often skipped and the one with the largest consequence. Seven of the nine execution gates do nothing until you give them a value. Decide, explicitly:
| Decide | Gate | If you skip it |
|---|---|---|
| Most you will lose in a day | daily_loss_limit | No daily loss cap exists |
| Most you will risk per trade | per_trade_risk | Position size is bounded only by capital |
| Most concurrent positions | max_open_positions | Unbounded concurrent exposure |
| Most trades per day | max_trades_per_day | Unbounded trade count |
| Losing streak that should stop trading | max_consecutive_losses | The strategy keeps trading through a losing run |
| Largest single order | max_order_value | Order size bounded only by capital |
| Mark-to-market loss that should halt entries | mark_to_market_loss | No unrealised-loss brake |
Full reference: The nine order gates.
Size the allocation to a tolerable drawdown, not to the return. If a backtest shows a 22% max drawdown, allocate an amount where a 22% loss is one you will actually sit through. The allocation is the only control that scales your loss directly.
Run paper first. A paper run in current conditions is the cheapest information you will ever buy about a strategy. It costs time and nothing else.
Verify the broker connection end to end. Confirm the connection is active and a balance read succeeds before you rely on it. See Connect a broker.
While a strategy runs
Monitor it. A deployed strategy is not unattended infrastructure. Check positions, P&L and risk state. See Monitoring.
Know how to stop it, and know what stopping does. Pause and Stop prevent new entries. Neither closes an open position. If you need to be flat, close the position at your broker.
Keep credentials current. Broker tokens expire and exchange keys can be revoked. A strategy that cannot place orders cannot place exit orders.
Watch your own account, not just the platform. Your broker is the record of truth for your positions, your balance and your obligations. Reconcile against it.
If you publish
Publishing creates obligations to other users. They are set out separately in Publisher rules. In summary: what you publish must be accurate, you must not present it as advice, and you must not use the listing's support channels to give trading instructions.
Tax and regulatory reporting
Every trade the platform places for you is your trade, taxable to you, reportable by you. Stretus does not compute your tax position and does not file anything on your behalf. The backtest cost model includes statutory charges for realism; it is not a tax statement. Your broker's contract notes and statements are the authoritative record.
What is not your responsibility
To be fair about the split:
- Order construction correctness. If the platform builds a malformed order, that is a platform defect, report it.
- Enforcing the limits you did set. Once configured, a gate is enforced on every order.
- The allocation ceiling and available-capital check. These cannot be disabled and are enforced regardless of configuration.
- Isolation between paper and live. The two paths do not leak into each other.
- Keeping your credentials encrypted at rest and scoped to order placement. See Data, custody & security.