---
name: World Cup is excluded from the pipeline — decided, don't re-pitch
description: User decided (pre-2026-07) not to track/bet the World Cup; reaffirmed 2026-07-04 after Claude re-suggested it during the Kalshi club-listings drought. Neutral venues break the home/away edge, max-liquidity market, and WC fixtures would contaminate the frozen xlow forward test.
type: project
---

The user raised World Cup tracking in an earlier session and the decision was NO. It was not recorded then; Claude re-suggested WC tracking on 2026-07-04 (during the Kalshi club-soccer listings freeze, when KXWCGAME was the only liquid soccer on Kalshi) and the user called out the inconsistency. Decision reaffirmed: **no World Cup, neither betting nor tracking.**

**Why:**
- The validated edge is HOME/AWAY CLV in club leagues; WC venues are neutral — the structural home-advantage the signal leans on doesn't exist.
- WC is Kalshi's deepest/sharpest soccer market ever (official partner, billions in volume). Per the volume study (project_kalshi_volume_edge_study), the strategy's worst league was its highest-volume one; WC is that effect maximized.
- Adding WC fixtures to `forward_test_unique_book.py` would POLLUTE the frozen xlow OOS sample with an off-regime market. A clean n=0 during a club-listings drought beats a contaminated n.
- One-off tournament, ~single-digit remaining games; nothing transfers.

**How to apply:** Don't suggest WC (or other international tournaments — Euros, Copa America; same neutral-venue/max-liquidity logic) for the pipeline or the forward trackers. If the user re-opens it themselves, treat it as a NEW strategy question requiring its own validation, not an extension of the club edge.