How should S-curve position factor into how we evaluate stocks?

The question

How should a technology's position on its adoption S-curve, the steepness of that curve, and the cost tipping point that drives it be encoded into the way the stock-market project evaluates a signal — so that "are we capturing enough growth when taking a new position" becomes an explicit input, not an afterthought? This is the bridge question this whole thread exists to answer.

Why it matters

The stock-market conviction model scores whether a causal chain is true (evidence per step), but not how much of the move is left or how fast it arrives. A chain can be fully confirmed yet already played out (near saturation), or partial yet sitting right at the inflection. S-curve position is an orthogonal timing + remaining-magnitude lens.

What we currently believe

Three usable encodings emerged from the research, matching the three angles the user prioritized — and they are now shipped:

1. Remaining-runway on upside. Curve position (penetration % vs. ceiling L) qualifies how much of the move is left — informs valuation upside / sizing, not chain-truth. Encoded as adoption.position + adoption.remaining_runway (+ optional penetration_pct).
2. Velocity → horizon/sizing only. Curve steepness k feeds time horizon and re-rate imminence — not conviction.score (locked decision (a)). Encoded as adoption.steepness → Signal classification.horizon / sizing.
3. Cost-curve tipping point as catalyst. A Wright's-Law (or physics/access) cost crossing becomes a datable catalyst. Encoded as adoption.cost_curve.parity_date → Signal catalysts[] + cost_parity_date.

The over-arching caveat from the research still holds: cost curves are forecastable, adoption timing and the ceiling are not (see forecastability-of-technological-progress), so position/velocity are coarse buckets with explicit falsifiers, applied per-segment.

Evidence we have

• From 2026-06-16-autoresearch-tony-seba-technology-disruption-s-curves: practitioner framing — growth decelerates as a technology penetrates its market, so remaining runway depends on entry position; Wright's Law links cost decline to demand; "fastest movers … capture the biggest rewards."
• From 2026-06-16-academic-research-technology-adoption-s-curves: adoption lags generate valuation/risk-premium cycles as "growth options" convert to "assets in place" (Gârleanu et al. 2012 — implies risk premium/expected return is highest earlier on the curve); portfolio theory distorts when assets follow experience curves (Way et al. 2017).
• From 2026-06-16-distill-technology-adoption-s-curves (stock-market source): the project-side framing — the lens is an evaluation layer over existing causal chains, operationalized as s-curve-evaluation-lens.
• Design + contract: docs/s-curve-evaluation-proposal.md; vault/_meta/RESEARCH.md optional adoption: block; brain services/signal-export/src/signal.ts SCHEMA_VERSION 3; trader lib/signal.ts mirror (trader PR #31, merged 2026-07-09 alongside brain PR #76).
• First real backfill (2026-07-09): seven adoption-shaped stock-market mechanisms now carry cited adoption: + ## Adoption read (see How we resolved).

Evidence we need

None for the encoding design — resolved. Ongoing operational work (not blockers on this question):

• Keep authoring adoption: only where citably justified; prefer unknown / null over fabricated precision.
• Re-emit via DAILY step 7 / signal-emit so populated blocks reach the trader.
• Later: trader-side weighting of adoption into sizing/horizon UI (contract receive-side only as of v3).

How we resolved

2026-07-09 — status → resolved.

Design decisions locked 2026-06-16:

• (a) steepness → horizon/sizing only, not conviction.score;
• (b) adoption orthogonal to cluster;
• (c) coarse buckets, not a fitted logistic;
• (d) penetration_pct nullable/optional.

Implementation complete:

Backfilled mechanisms (cited buckets; helium / FERC / macro-policy chains deliberately skipped as non-S-curve):

Related

• s-curve-evaluation-lens
• technology-adoption-s-curve
• curve-steepness-and-adoption-velocity
• wrights-law
• cost-curve-tipping-point-to-s-curve-adoption