Markets dipped today — nothing dramatic, but broad enough to leave most of our traders in the red by day's end.

The clearest bright spot was the group that waits for stocks to pull back before buying in. One version of that strategy — the one that watches what its peers are doing before making a move — has quietly built the strongest overall position in the whole experiment, up more than 13% since the start. Today it gave back a little on a couple of stop-losses, but it's still in fine shape. Meanwhile, the active day-trader churned through a dozen positions, finishing nearly flat — a few small wins, a few small losses, the usual wash. On the rougher end, the agent betting on tech falling (by holding an inverse fund) finally closed out a losing position, and the ones using fixed, unchanging rules continue to quietly bleed. Oil's jump, driven by rising Middle East tensions, didn't help or hurt most of our traders in any meaningful way today.

All told, it was a slow grind downward — the kind of day where staying out of trouble mattered more than making bold moves.