Release note

Plain-English portfolio goals get multiple backtest variants

1 min read
UXresearchaccuracy

Asking for "a diversified healthcare portfolio targeting 12% annualised" used to require you to know the system's preferred phrasing. The new goal translator parses free-form portfolio descriptions — sector, target return, risk constraints, holding period — and produces a small set of backtest variants that each match the goal in a different way.

Instead of one answer, you get three to five honest options. A momentum-biased version. An equal-weight buy-and-hold. A volatility-targeted version. Each gets a one-line summary of the trade-offs ("higher CAGR, deeper drawdowns") so you can compare without having to read every result card.

This pairs with the expectation-screen card that now appears between query and results — it tells you upfront what the realistic range looks like for the kind of strategy you described, before any specific numbers come back. Anchoring matters; quoting a single backtest as "the answer" implies a precision the data doesn't support.

Source sprint log: SPRINT_LOG-C-1-goal-translator.md— transparency-by-default. The full log lives in the repo.