Humbleboy

Wallet: 0x4b59e178095b9bb5ba97598244f2ca8b02fc3aa6 Window: 2026-09-10 to 2026-10-13 (34 calendar days, 34 active) Universe: 1,809 trades across 151 markets, 148 events. $411K BUY notional, $3,750 SELL notional.

The Punchline

Humbleboy is a Counter-Strike 2 esports match bettor who posts limit orders across CS2 match markets on Polymarket, holds positions to resolution, and earns maker rebates on his fills. He runs 97.5% maker. He almost never exits before settlement -- 1 SELL across 1,808 BUYs.

The strategy is not sophisticated in structure but is substantial in scale: $411K of BUY notional across 34 days on a time-weighted capital base of $145K. He accumulates inventory gradually via small limit orders on multiple matches, then receives lumpy settlement payments when matches resolve. The daily P&L curve is violent: -$27,253 on September 11, +$41,752 on October 4, +$19,626 on September 27.

The directional accuracy at the trade level is approximately break-even (48.6% win rate on binary markets). The account is kept afloat by maker rebates ($1,495 over 34 days) and by concentrating larger bets on higher-probability outcomes where the calibration is better. The biggest verified income stream is the rebate program, which generates positive carry regardless of match outcomes.

The dominant fact about this wallet is the data quality problem. The pipeline's two accounting methods produce P&L estimates $17,868 apart. This report presents the cash-ledger figures where available and flags where uncertainty is high.

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What He Trades

Counter-Strike 2, exclusively. The 1,777-trade Esports category holds 98.3% of resolved volume. The 32-trade "Other" category holds the remainder, mostly one large losing bet on "Will Vitality Win the ESL Pro League Season 24?" (-$3,990).

Within CS2, the market coverage is broad by tier:

He does not restrict himself to top-tier events. Some of his biggest wins came from mid-tier events: B8 vs Luminosity across two separate tournaments netted over $10,400 combined. Some of his biggest losses came from regional events: G2 Ares vs WBT Academy (NODWIN) lost $5,012, paiN vs ShindeN (PGL SA Qualifier) lost $5,040.

Market handicap markets are a notable secondary focus. At least four of the top positions in the economics.markets table are map handicap markets (NEMI -1.5, G2 -1.5, VIT -1.5, FAL -1.5). These are more granular than match winner markets and imply he has views on scoreline margins, not just winners.

The profitable zone is $0.60+. Everything below $0.60 loses money at the trade level. The sub-$0.30 zone is a complete wipeout (0% win rate, $5,202 lost). This is not a longshot bettor who profits from variance -- it is a bettor who loses on his underdog calls and wins on his favorite calls, with the wins and losses roughly balancing out before rebates.

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The Order of Operations: One Match, Position by Position

The most instructive example is Counter-Strike: Team Nemesis vs Wildcard (BO3) - Thunderpick World Championship Closed Qualifier Group B, September 11. This is one of the largest losing positions in the book: $4,950 deployed, $0 returned.

Walk-through:

Team Nemesis opened at $0.63, implying the market viewed them as a 63% favorite over Wildcard. Humbleboy agreed and started accumulating at 07:16 UTC with a tiny probe fill of 14 shares for $8.82.

Rather than placing one large order, he dribbled fills across nearly four hours: single fills at 07:34, 07:43, 07:47, a burst of two simultaneous fills at 08:13, then a cascade of 13+ fills between 09:24 and 09:57 as he committed the bulk of the position ($4,000+ in that window alone).

The late burst is characteristic of his accumulation pattern: he tests the price, confirms it's still available at $0.63, then loads up. The price never moved during his accumulation -- all 32 fills executed at exactly $0.63. This is consistent with a thick orderbook (or his own limit orders setting the price) at that level.

Wildcard won the match. Team Nemesis shares paid $0.00. Loss: -$4,950.

Contrast with his best single-market result: Sinners vs K27 (1win Private Club #1 Playoffs), September 27. He spent $4,720 accumulating Sinners across 9 fills at mixed prices around $0.47, and collected $10,099 in settlement -- a +$5,379 net (114% return on capital for that position). Both matches were mid-tier CS2. The difference was purely which team won.

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Why It Works (or Doesn't): The Math

The honest EV picture is mixed:

<pre><code>Trade-level accounting (resolved buys): 1,777 resolved buys | 864 wins | 913 losses Win rate: 48.6% Capital deployed: $403,215 Strategy-layer P&L: -$15,754 (pipeline flags this as potentially wrong) Cash-ledger trading P&L: +$2,114 (authoritative per pipeline)

Per-outcome average (rough): Win: recover $1.00/share on avg cost of ~$0.45-$0.55 Loss: forfeit entire stake Net at 48.6% WR with avg entry ~$0.50: roughly break-even

Maker rebates: $1,495.52 earned over 34 days = $44/day baseline income regardless of match outcomes = 0.37% of BUY notional

Total account estimate (cash ledger + incentives): $2,114 + $1,516 = +$3,630 On $144,804 time-weighted capital = +2.5% return for the window</code></pre>

The strategy generates a small but positive return primarily from the maker rebate structure. The directional component is effectively a wash at the trade level. This is a rebate-capture strategy with a directional overlay, not a pure alpha-generating directional strategy.

The variance is enormous. A single wrong call on a $5,000 position is a $5,000 loss. A right call is a $5,000 gain (the settlement mechanics pay $1/share). The expected value of a single position is:

<pre><code>For a position entered at $0.50 (implied 50% probability): EV = 0.50 * ($1.00 - $0.50) - 0.50 * $0.50 = $0.25 - $0.25 = $0.00 Plus rebate: ~0.37% of $0.50 = +$0.00185 per share Net EV per share: +$0.00185 (positive, but tiny)

For a position entered at $0.65 (implied 65% probability), if he's right: EV = WR * ($1.00 - $0.65) - (1 - WR) * $0.65 At observed 75.4% WR in that band: EV = 0.754 * $0.35 - 0.246 * $0.65 = $0.264 - $0.160 = +$0.104 per share</code></pre>

The $0.60-$0.70 band is where real positive EV exists: 75.4% actual win rate against 65% implied, a genuine edge of roughly 10 percentage points. If this calibration holds out of sample, that band is where the strategy earns its directional alpha.

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Phase 1: Trader Profile

Scale and activity:

• 1,809 total fills: 1,808 BUYs, 1 SELL
• $411,066 BUY notional, $3,750 SELL notional
• 151 unique markets, 148 unique events
• 34 of 34 calendar days active
• ~53 fills per day (highly variable: 1 fill on Sept 15, 199 fills on Sept 11)

Trade size distribution (power-law, heavy-tailed):

The median/mean ratio of 11x is a classic heavy-tail signature. The bottom 50% of fills by USDC carry only 1.4% of capital. Humbleboy places many small test/probe fills and a few enormous clips.

Execution pattern:

• Median inter-fill gap (same market+outcome): 59.5 seconds
• 31% of consecutive fills under 10 seconds
• 50% under 60 seconds
• 92% under 1 hour
• Mean gap: 27.6 minutes

This is semi-automated or manual execution -- not a high-frequency bot. The 59.5-second median gap and the visible accumulation pattern (probe, confirm, load) is consistent with a human or a slow automated system placing limit orders. The sub-10s fills (31%) represent burst windows where he hits a batch of orders simultaneously.

Active hours (UTC): Peak hours are 06:00-09:00 UTC (EU morning, when many CS2 matches play), with a secondary peak at 20:00-22:00 UTC. The highest-volume hour is 08:00 UTC (260 trades). Notable dead zones at 02:00-04:00 UTC.

Buy/sell ratio: 1,808:1. For practical purposes, he never exits.

Archetype: B (Directional betting), with no market-making component (0% both-sides rate) and active rebate capture via consistent maker limit order posting.

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Phase 2: Core Strategy Identification

Both-sides participation: 0 of 151 markets (0.0%).

Humbleboy is a one-directional bettor on every single market. Zero both-sides markets means zero spread capture, zero hedge tax, zero MM component. The strategy is pure directional.

Classification: B (Directional Betting) + Maker Rebate Capture

He is NOT:

• A market maker (0% both-sides rate)
• A latency arbitrageur (fills spread over hours on a single match, not seconds)
• A copy-trader (no systematic lag pattern; picks his own sides)
• A DCA accumulator (does revisit markets repeatedly, but within a single match event's lifecycle)

He IS:

• A CS2 match bettor with genuine team knowledge or a rating system
• A maker-order strategist earning daily rebates
• A high-conviction position builder who uses many small orders to build a single large position at a stable price

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Phase 3: Dominance Ratio Analysis

Not applicable. Zero both-sides markets means the dominance ratio framework has no data to operate on. All conviction expression is through bet size, not through asymmetric two-sided allocation.

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Phase 4: Entry Price Analysis

The price band distribution shows capital concentrated in the $0.40-$0.60 zone, which is the coin-flip region for binary match markets. This is where most contested CS2 matches price.

The sub-band inspection reveals Humbleboy uses a wide range of entry prices -- not a single-tick anchor. The most common prices cluster around standard levels: $0.44, $0.47, $0.51, $0.54, $0.59, $0.63 -- these correspond to typical market pricing for modest favorites. He is not cherry-picking a specific probability; he buys whatever price the market offers for his preferred team.

The ROI profile by band is the most important finding:

• Below $0.40: Catastrophic. The $0.20-$0.30 band has 0% win rate (101 trades, $4,152 deployed, -100% ROI). The $0.30-$0.40 band loses 28%. These are underdog bets going badly wrong.
• $0.40-$0.60: Near break-even. Win rates of 45-57% roughly matching the implied probabilities. Little directional edge here.
• $0.60+: Clear positive ROI. The $0.60-$0.70 band shows 75.4% win rate against 65% implied -- a real edge. The $0.70-$0.80 band shows 100% win rate on only 2 trades ($6,483 capital), but those 2 trades returned $3,804 in P&L.

The accumulation pattern (many small fills at a stable price) implies he places passive limit orders at his target price and lets the orderbook fill him over time. This is why 97.5% of fills are maker: he posts the bid and waits.

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Phase 5: Category and Market-Type Breakdown

The "Other" category is dominated by the "Will Vitality Win..." futures market -- a -$3,990 single-ticket loss. With that removed, the Other category is small and immaterial.

The Esports P&L of -$14,520 is the strategy-layer figure, which the pipeline flags as potentially unreliable (the cash-ledger shows a positive trading result). At minimum, the esports book is near break-even at the trade level, with rebates pushing the account into modest positive territory.

Top 10 markets by P&L (best):

Top 10 markets by P&L (worst):

The wins and losses are remarkably symmetric in magnitude (both cluster around $4,000-$5,000 maximum per market). This is consistent with a position-size cap per market, even if the cap is not rigidly enforced.

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Phase 6: Timing and Execution

Hourly P&L (UTC):

The 07:00-09:00 UTC window has the most trades and the worst outcomes. This is when European CS2 matches tend to start. The 17:00-18:00 UTC window also shows severe losses (9.3% and 0% win rates respectively) -- these are late afternoon EU / early evening matches.

The 00:00-04:00 UTC window shows high win rates (75-87%) but very low trade counts. This likely reflects matches at late EU/early NA times where Humbleboy's knowledge is stronger or the competition for orderbook slots is thinner.

Day-of-week:

Friday carries the most trades (577) and a terrible 37.9% win rate -- his most active day is also his worst by ROI. Sunday has the second-fewest trades but the best outcomes by a large margin.

Burst patterns: The accumulation pattern is clear in the CSV. On September 11 at 06:15 UTC, he fires 8 fills in 30 seconds on paiN vs ShindeN (all at $0.56, totaling ~$2,461 in one burst). Then at 06:30, a final large $2,461 clip. This is a two-phase accumulation: many small fills to build a partial position, then one large fill to complete it.

The same pattern appears on 3DMAX vs 100 Thieves at the same time (06:15-06:38 UTC, interleaved with the paiN fills). He was simultaneously building two positions at once during that morning session on September 11 -- the day with the largest single-day loss (-$27,253 from the cash ledger).

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Phase 7: Filter Experiments

The hour exclusion filter is the most powerful available: excluding hours 05, 08, 17, and 18 UTC swings the book from -$15,747 to +$16,786, a $32,533 improvement. This is a genuine finding.

See the Filter tab for full per-filter commentary.

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Phase 8: Rolling Window Consistency

The consistency profile is poor for the full window period but improves dramatically in weeks 4-6. The first three weeks (Sept 10 - Sept 27) showed consistently negative rolling windows -- every 7-day and 15-day window was red during this stretch. Then a sharp reversal on Sept 27 (+$19,626 in one day) and Oct 4 (+$41,752 in one day) drove the rolling windows green. The final two weeks showed predominantly positive rolling windows.

Weekly P&L trajectory:

The strategy-layer shows a cumulative loss of -$15,748 at window close. The cash-ledger shows approximately +$2,114. Both agree the early weeks were catastrophic and the late weeks recovered. The disagreement is in the magnitude of the recovery.

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Phase 9: P&L Decomposition

The spread P&L is zero (0% both-sides markets). The hedge tax is zero. There is no MM component. All P&L is from directional resolution plus rebates.

The $1,495 in maker rebates is earned daily at rates between $10 and $140/day. The highest single-day rebate was $140 (Sept 11) -- the same day he had his worst trading loss. The rebates are uncorrelated with outcome: they're earned on fill volume, not on whether the bet won.

The rebate stream alone is insufficient to make the strategy profitable at scale -- $1,495 over 34 days ($44/day) on a $145K time-weighted capital base is only 1% annualized. But it does meaningfully reduce the break-even required from the directional component.

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Phase 10: Strategy Specification

One-sentence summary: A CS2 esports match bettor who accumulates one-sided limit-order positions across BO1, BO3, and BO5 matches, holds to settlement, and earns daily maker rebates as positive carry on the book.

Edge sources:

1. Maker rebates: $44/day guaranteed regardless of outcomes
2. Directional accuracy in the $0.60-$0.70 zone: 75.4% observed win rate vs 65% implied (if persistent)
3. Tournament knowledge enabling selection of favorable markets

What works: High-price-band entries (above $0.60), Sunday scheduling, avoiding 07:00-09:00 and 17:00-18:00 UTC windows, B8 and Sinners team picks (both featured prominently in the top winners list)

What drags: Sub-$0.40 entries (0% win rate, -100% ROI), Friday/Monday activity, the 07:00-08:00 UTC morning EU session, regional match exposure (NODWIN, FERJEE)

Data quality note: The strategy-layer P&L figure is unreliable. The cash-ledger and Polymarket figures disagree by $8,148. The full-window account result is uncertain. Use the Filter tab's exclude-worst-hours finding as the most actionable signal from this analysis.

Wallet: 0x4b59e178095b9bb5ba97598244f2ca8b02fc3aa6 Window: 2026-09-10 → 2026-10-13 (34 active / 34 calendar days) Methodology: Cash-flow P/L = -buy_usdc + sell_usdc + remaining_share_payout. Resolved shares settle at $1 (win) / $0 (loss); open positions marked at last price.

Phase 1 - Trader Profile

Scale

Trade-size distribution (USDC per fill)

Inter-trade gap, same (market, outcome)

Phase 2 & 3 - Both-Sides Participation, Dominance Curve

• Both-sides rate: 0.00% (0 of 151 markets)

Dominance buckets

Phase 4 - Entry-Price Analysis

Phase 5 - Category & Vertical Breakdown

Phase 6 - Timing & Execution

Net P/L by hour (UTC)

Phase 8 - Rolling Window Consistency

• Rolling 7-day windows green: 17 of 34 (50.0%)
• Rolling 7-day P/L range: -$57,433 → +$37,394
• Rolling 15-day windows green: 16 of 34 (47.1%)
• Rolling 15-day P/L range: -$64,755 → +$43,302

Weekly P/L

Phase 9 - P/L Decomposition

Phase 10 - Top Markets by Volume

Top 10 winners by P/L

Top 10 losers by P/L

Report generated 2026-10-15 00:19 UTC.

Wallet: 0x4b59e178095b9bb5ba97598244f2ca8b02fc3aa6 Window: 2026-09-10 to 2026-10-13 Baseline: 1,777 resolved BUYs, 48.6% WR, $403,215 deployed, -$15,747 P&L, -3.9% ROI (strategy-layer; pipeline flags this figure as potentially unreliable) Cash-ledger trading P&L (authoritative): +$2,114. Incentive income: +$1,516 maker/taker rebates. Best estimate of account result: +$3,630.

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The headline result

The hour exclusion filter produces the largest improvement of any filter tested -- a $32,533 swing. This is a load-bearing finding.

The price filter produces modest improvement (+$5,202) by removing the catastrophic sub-$0.30 zone. The category filter is nearly meaningless (single-category book). The high-conviction filter returns zero (no both-sides markets). The combined filter stacks to +$37,836 improvement.

These are strategy-layer numbers throughout. Apply appropriate skepticism.

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Filter results table

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Filter-by-filter commentary

1. Price filter ($0.30-$0.70) → MODEST LIFT

Removing the 120 trades outside this range (19 in $0.10-$0.20 and 101 in $0.20-$0.30) eliminates $5,202 of losses. These were the sub-$0.30 positions that paid out at 0% win rate -- all 120 trades resolved against Humbleboy.

The sub-$0.20 zone (19 trades, $1,050, 0% WR) and sub-$0.30 zone (101 trades, $4,152, 0% WR) are straightforward: he backed underdogs who had no wins. Removing these raises the book's win rate from 48.6% to 52.1% and reduces the loss from -$15,747 to -$10,545.

Verdict: This filter helps, but only by removing obvious losers, not by identifying a forward-looking selection rule. A bettor with better underdog selection would not need it. A replicator should apply it as a hard floor: no entries below $0.30.

The question of whether to extend it to $0.40 is more nuanced. The $0.30-$0.40 band has 42.5% win rate and -28.4% ROI -- weak but not zero. Removing it would add another $15,151 in apparent P&L improvement but would also cut 372 trades, many of which are the "moderate underdog" positions that form part of the strategy's deliberate reach. A strict $0.40 floor removes more directional exposure than intended.

Recommended threshold: $0.30 hard floor, $0.40 soft preference.

2. High-conviction dominance filter → NOT APPLICABLE

Zero both-sides markets. The dominance ratio framework requires at least one market where the trader bought both YES and NO. None exist here. The filter returns an empty set.

This is structural, not a calibration issue. Humbleboy is a one-sided bettor and this filter will always return zero on this wallet.

3. Top category filter (Esports) → NO-OP

98.3% of the book is already Esports. Removing the 32-trade "Other" category (which includes the -$3,990 Vitality futures loss) adds $1,227 to the P&L figure. This is a meaningful absolute number but represents a trivial tactical change -- just avoid tournament-winner futures markets when your book is match-by-match.

The Esports-only filter improves win rate from 48.6% to 48.8% (negligible). The real improvement is purely from removing the one bad futures bet.

Verdict: Apply as a rule: only trade match markets, not tournament-winner futures. The evidence is one data point but the directional skill that applies to individual match outcomes does not obviously transfer to multi-week tournament futures.

4. Hour exclusion filter (hours 5, 8, 17, 18 UTC) → MEANINGFUL LIFT

This is the most important filter finding. Excluding four specific UTC hours swings the strategy-layer P&L from -$15,747 to +$16,786 -- a $32,533 improvement.

The four worst hours by realized P&L:

• 08:00 UTC: 260 trades, 32.3% WR, -$13,616 P&L (single worst hour by absolute loss)
• 07:00 UTC: 161 trades, 38.1% WR, -$14,429 P&L (second worst)
• 17:00 UTC: 54 trades, 9.3% WR, -$7,432 P&L (worst win rate hour with meaningful volume)
• 18:00 UTC: 30 trades, 0.0% WR, -$7,375 P&L (0% win rate on 30 trades)

Together, these four hours account for 505 trades ($73,658 deployed) with a collective win rate of roughly 27% -- dramatically below the 48.6% baseline. The losses in these four hours exceed the total strategy-layer loss for the entire window.

Why these specific hours? Contextually: 07:00-09:00 UTC is when European CS2 matches begin in the morning, often at group stage level with many matches running simultaneously. The match quality and Humbleboy's accuracy appear systematically worse during this window. Similarly, 17:00-18:00 UTC is late EU afternoon / early US matches -- a possible attention or information-quality gap.

The 0% win rate at 18:00 UTC is particularly striking. Across 30 trades, not a single one resolved in his favor. This is very unlikely to be random at a 50% base rate (probability: 0.5^30 < 0.000000001). It implies either a small sample of particularly bad markets, or a systematic edge reversal during that hour.

Verdict: A replicator should track hourly win rates carefully and apply a kill switch for sessions where the rolling win rate in a given hour drops below 35%. The specific hours identified here (5, 8, 17, 18) should be avoided until out-of-sample evidence suggests they have improved.

5. Combined filter (price $0.30-$0.70 + exclude worst hours) → MEANINGFUL LIFT

Stacking both filters produces 1,314 trades at 56.5% WR, +$22,089 P&L, +6.8% ROI -- a $37,836 improvement over baseline. The combined filter removes 463 trades (26% of the book) while improving every performance metric substantially.

The win rate of 56.5% on a book of binary match markets implies genuine directional accuracy above the coin-flip baseline. If this win rate is persistent, the filtered strategy generates real alpha.

Important caveat: The combined filter selects specifically on historical performance, which risks overfitting. The hour exclusion in particular -- dropping four specific UTC hours that happened to be bad -- may not persist. The price filter (removing sub-$0.30 positions) is more likely to be durable because the 0% win rate at sub-$0.30 reflects persistent underdog selection errors, not random variance.

What filters would genuinely add value if measurable

The standard filter battery misses the most relevant selection dimensions for a CS2 match bettor:

None of these are computable from the trade CSV alone, but they represent the genuine alpha-selection levers for a CS2-specific bettor.

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Bottom line for replication

Three concrete filter recommendations:

1. Apply a $0.30 hard floor. The sub-$0.30 zone has 0% win rate. No entry below $0.30 under any circumstances. Extend to $0.40 as a soft preference.

1. Avoid 07:00-09:00 and 17:00-18:00 UTC. These four hours produced catastrophic win rates (27% combined) and account for the bulk of strategy-layer losses. The mechanism is unclear but the pattern is consistent enough to act on.

1. Stick to match winner markets, not tournament futures. The one tournament-futures bet (-$3,990, Vitality EPL Season 24) shows the directional skill that applies to match-by-match betting may not transfer to multi-week outright markets.

The combined filter adds $37,836 to the strategy-layer P&L on historical data. Applied to the cash-ledger basis, the improvement would be somewhat different but in the same direction. The hour filter is the highest-value single change available.

Source wallet: 0x4b59e178095b9bb5ba97598244f2ca8b02fc3aa6 Strategy: CS2 esports match directional betting with maker limit-order execution and rebate capture Data quality note: P&L figures carry significant uncertainty due to a pipeline reconciliation failure. All P&L estimates in this playbook are approximate. The maker rebate income ($1,495 over 34 days) is directly measured and reliable.

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One-paragraph operator brief

Post limit-order bids on Counter-Strike 2 match markets on Polymarket. Pick one side per match (never both). Accumulate via small maker fills over minutes to hours, building to a target position size of $2,000-$5,000 per match. Hold to resolution -- no exits. Earn daily maker rebates as positive carry. Focus on matches where your confidence in one team exceeds the implied probability shown by the market price, specifically targeting entries in the $0.40-$0.70 price range. Avoid entering below $0.30. Avoid trading during 07:00-09:00 UTC and 17:00-18:00 UTC. Do not bet tournament-winner futures. Expect high daily P&L variance (individual match results dominate) with rebate income smoothing the floor.

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1. Market Selection

Why this scope: The reference wallet covers CS2 exclusively across 34 days. The broadest market access (all tournament tiers) gives more opportunities to deploy capital, though the reference data suggests T1/mid-tier markets show better calibration than regional events. The one non-CS2 bet (Vitality EPL futures) was the worst single market in the book.

Map handicap markets are a meaningful secondary focus. Markets like NEMI (-1.5), G2 (-1.5), and VIT (-1.5) appeared in the top-performing positions. These require an additional layer of knowledge (scoreline confidence, not just win confidence) but can offer better-priced edges when a dominant team is expected to win convincingly.

Priority queue for market selection:

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2. Entry Logic

The reference wallet uses a two-phase accumulation pattern: small probe fills to verify price availability and book depth, followed by one or more large completion fills when confidence is confirmed.

Entry protocol:
  1. Identify match, pick one side based on your assessment
  2. Place limit bid at target price (do not lift the ask)
  3. Wait for partial fills (probe phase, typically $20-$200 in first fills)
  4. If price holds and match context unchanged:
     complete position with larger fills toward target size
  5. If price moves against your bid before fills:
     reassess -- the market has new information you may not have

Entry price constraints:
  - Hard minimum: $0.30 (no entries below)
  - Target range: $0.40-$0.70 (best historical performance zone)
  - Above $0.70: only with very high conviction (2 trades in reference book, both won)
  - Maximum single-market position: $5,000 (reference book's practical ceiling)

Price targeting within the band:

The reference wallet buys at specific prices anchored to whatever the orderbook offers for his preferred team. He does not place market orders. He posts a bid at the price he thinks is fair and lets others fill him.

Typical price levels for CS2 favorites: $0.44, $0.47, $0.50, $0.54, $0.59, $0.63, $0.69. These correspond to common odds for slight to strong favorites in mid-tier CS2.

Timing constraint -- when to enter:

Do not place bets during the following UTC windows:

• 07:00-09:00 UTC: Worst performing window (combined ~27% win rate in worst hours)
• 17:00-18:00 UTC: 0-9% win rate in these hours, systematic underperformance

The best entry hours by outcome:

• 00:00-04:00 UTC: High win rates (75-87%) but low match count
• 10:00-16:00 UTC: Solid performance, moderate match availability
• 20:00-22:00 UTC: Good secondary window

If a match is scheduled to start during 07:00-09:00 UTC, either skip it or ensure your position is fully built before 07:00.

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3. Sizing Model

The reference wallet uses a heavily right-skewed sizing approach: many small probe fills and occasional large completion fills. The median fill is $21 but the mean is $229, showing that the large clips dominate total capital.

For replication, a simplified version:

Concentration limit: No single match should represent more than 10% of total bankroll. The reference book shows markets hitting $5,000-$7,650 in a small number of cases -- this is very high concentration on individual outcomes and is a key source of the violent daily P&L swings.

The two-phase fill approach:

Phase 1 (probe): Place a limit bid for $20-$200 at your target price. If it fills within 5-10 minutes, the price is available and the market is willing. Proceed to Phase 2.

Phase 2 (completion): Once the probe fills and your thesis is confirmed (no new team news, no price movement against you), add the bulk of your target position via additional limit orders. The reference wallet shows completion clips of $300-$3,000 placed all at once or in rapid succession.

This two-phase approach serves two purposes: it protects against stale prices (if the market has moved before you checked, your probe won't fill at a favorable price), and it avoids locking up capital in matches you'll ultimately skip.

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4. Exit Strategy

The reference wallet has one SELL across 1,808 BUYs. The exit strategy is: hold everything to resolution.

This is not a recommendation for blind hold-to-resolution -- it is a description of what this wallet does. The consequences are:

• Large open-position inventory ($211K peak, $145K time-weighted)
• Daily P&L driven by which positions happen to resolve that day
• No ability to cut losses on matches going badly during live play

For a replicator, the hold-to-resolution approach makes sense for two reasons:

1. CS2 BO3 and BO5 markets often have limited live-sell liquidity before resolution
2. The maker rebate is earned on the buy-side; selling early does not earn additional rebate and may require crossing the spread

If you want the option to exit, verify that the specific market has active sell-side liquidity before entering. Many CS2 markets show thin books on the sell side, and selling a $5,000 position before resolution may require accepting significant slippage.

When to consider an early exit (exceptional cases):

• A team forfeit, player disqualification, or lineup change is announced during the match
• The score has gone 2-0 against your team in a BO3 (essentially resolved already, but position carries lingering risk)
• You need capital released for a higher-conviction opportunity

Otherwise: hold to resolution and accept the variance.

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5. Bankroll and Capital Management

The reference wallet's capital structure is unusual: turnover-to-capital ratio of 1.96x over 34 days means he deployed roughly $414K of notional on a $145K time-weighted capital base. The peak open-position value reached $211K. This implies significant recycling: positions resolve, capital is freed, new positions are opened.

For a replicator starting fresh:

Working capital estimate:
  Maximum concurrent open positions: 10-20 matches (reference wallet touches
  ~5 new markets per day, with matches resolving over 1-3 days each)
  
  Average position size: $2,000-$5,000
  Concurrent exposure: 10-20 positions × $2,000-$5,000 = $20,000-$100,000
  
  Recommended liquid bankroll: $50,000-$150,000 for reference-scale operation
  
  Maker rebates earned per $100K of buy notional: ~$370
  (0.37% rebate rate based on reference book)
  Expected rebate income per day at $10K daily turnover: ~$37

The rebates are earned per fill, not per day. The reference wallet earned $44/day average across 34 days but the daily amounts ranged from $4.83 (low-activity day) to $139.88 (high-activity day).

Key risk metric to monitor: Peak open-position value. At $211K, a single catastrophic multi-match session could wipe out weeks of positive P&L. Set a hard cap at 30% of bankroll in any single match, and 60% of bankroll across all concurrent positions.

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6. Tournament Calendar and Scheduling

CS2 match betting is inherently episodic. Major tournaments run for 2-4 weeks with daily match slates. The reference wallet's activity peaks track tournament calendars.

Active tournaments in the reference window (Sept-Oct 2026):

• ESL Pro League (T1, multi-week)
• PGL Masters Bucharest qualifiers (T1, 2-week run)
• StarLadder StarSeries Fall (T1)
• Thunderpick World Championship Closed Qualifier (mid-tier)
• 1win Private Club (mid-tier, recurring series)
• Logitech G Play Connect / Stake Ranked Episode 4 (mid-tier)
• NODWIN, FISSURE PLAYGROUND, FERJEE (regional, use with caution)
• iBUYPOWER Masters FML (mid-tier)

Scheduling rules:

1. Check CS2 tournament schedules weekly. The highest-action days are tournament bracket days (quarterfinals, semifinals, finals) where 4-8 matches may run in a single session.

1. Group stage vs playoff caution: Group stage matches often involve upsets as teams probe opponents. Playoff matches tend to show stronger form consistency. The reference wallet's worst results cluster around group stage and qualifier matches.

1. Day-of-week pattern: Sunday showed +38.4% ROI vs Friday's -14.9%. Sunday finals/bracket days are the highest-quality betting sessions. Avoid loading up on Friday group stage early rounds.

1. Time zone note: European CS2 tournaments typically schedule matches at 14:00-20:00 Central European Time (13:00-19:00 UTC in summer, 12:00-18:00 UTC in winter). North American matches start later. The reference wallet's performance is worst during EU morning matches (07:00-09:00 UTC) and improves significantly in the EU afternoon (14:00-16:00 UTC).

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7. Operational Requirements

Maker execution detail: To post limit orders on Polymarket, submit bids below the current ask. The reference wallet achieves 97.5% maker fills, meaning almost every fill came from a resting limit order that another trader lifted. This requires posting your bid and waiting -- sometimes for minutes, sometimes for hours. The two benefits: no fee (zero-fee basis for maker fills) plus maker rebates on the volume.

For high-volume matches (T1 events), liquidity is typically sufficient to fill $2,000-$5,000 of limit orders within 1-2 hours of posting. For thin regional matches, the same position may take 4-6 hours to fill or may not fully fill before match start.

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8. Edge Source and Validity

The strategy's edge has two distinct components with different reliability profiles:

Component 1: Maker rebates ($1,495 / 34 days = $44/day) This is mechanical and reliable. Posting limit orders on CS2 markets earns maker rebates from Polymarket's incentive program. The rate is approximately 0.37% of buy notional. This income is earned regardless of match outcomes. It is the lowest-variance component of the strategy's returns.

Component 2: Directional CS2 match accuracy (uncertain) The reference wallet's 48.6% overall win rate on binary markets is near break-even. The $0.60-$0.70 price band shows 75.4% win rate (vs 65% implied) suggesting genuine edge there, but this is 264 trades -- a reasonable but not large sample. The sub-$0.40 win rates are catastrophic (0-42.5%), indicating the directional accuracy is conditional on entering at prices reflecting genuine favorites, not reaching for underdogs.

The honest assessment: the directional component's edge is unproven at statistical significance over this 34-day window. The data quality issue compounds this uncertainty. A replicator should treat directional accuracy as the hypothesis to be tested, not the established fact.

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9. Risk Profile

Maximum daily drawdown: The reference wallet showed -$27,253 on September 11 (cash-ledger basis). This was a day with many positions resolving against him simultaneously. At $50K bankroll, that would represent a 54% single-day drawdown -- catastrophic. Proper position sizing (no more than 5-10% per match) would bound the worst-case single day to 20-30% of bankroll.

Strategy kill switch: If the rolling 7-day win rate drops below 40% on more than 100 resolved trades, pause and audit. This is the signal that either your team knowledge is degrading or market conditions have changed. Do not add size to recover losses.

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10. Diagnostic Checklist

Run weekly. The strategy is working if:

Monthly review: Compare your team-by-team win rate to your entry prices. If you are consistently betting teams at $0.65 that only win 55% of the time, the edge is negative despite appearing to be in the right price band. Track this per team over rolling 90-day periods.

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What This Playbook Does Not Include

• Both-sides trading. The reference wallet never does it. Adding a hedge position on the opposing team would earn spread on the paired cost but introduce the complexity of paired-cost management and dilute the directional signal.

• Live in-play betting. All reference positions are pre-match or early match. The strategy does not include real-time score-adjusted betting during live play.

• Tournament futures / outright winner markets. The one futures bet in the reference book (-$3,990, Vitality EPL) was the worst non-match-winner position. Multi-week futures require different analytical skills than match-by-match assessment.

• Automated execution. The reference wallet's 59.5-second median inter-fill gap and visible human-pattern accumulation implies manual or semi-manual operation. A fully automated system would need CS2 match scheduling data, team rating feeds, and automatic limit order management -- a more complex build than the underlying strategy justifies.

• Any sub-$0.30 positions. The 0% win rate in that zone is clear. No underdog positions in that price range under any circumstances.

The strategy is simple in concept: pick CS2 winners, post limit orders, collect rebates, hold to settlement. The difficulty is in the CS2 knowledge layer, not in the execution mechanics. If you do not have a reliable basis for rating CS2 teams above the market's implied probability, do not run this strategy at scale.