A slice you could lose completely without changing anything about your life — sized in advance and written down in dollars. For many people that's a modest share of their crypto money, sitting alongside long-term holdings and cash. The number matters less than deciding it before the bot runs, not after.
Why size the bot's slice before it ever trades?
Because the number you pick in advance comes from your judgment, and the number you pick afterward comes from your emotions. A bot with a hot first month whispers "double it"; a bot that stumbles early shouts "pull everything." Both reactions answer the wrong question — one month of results, good or bad, says very little about a strategy. Writing the allocation down before launch, in dollars, turns it into a commitment: the bot manages this much, and results inside the slice don't move the boundary. The sizing test is blunt: if this entire amount went to zero tomorrow, would anything about your life actually change? If the honest answer is yes, the slice is too big.
What does a sensible split look like in practice?
As an illustration — not a prescription — take someone with $10,000 committed to crypto overall:
| Bucket | Amount | Job |
|---|---|---|
| Long-term holdings | $7,000 | Coins held for years; untouched by the bot |
| Cash / stablecoin reserve | $2,000 | Dry powder and sleep insurance |
| Bot allocation | $1,000 | The experiment, sized to be losable |
Here the bot gets $1,000 — 10% of crypto money, and a far smaller share of total net worth once everything outside crypto is counted. Run the blunt test on it: losing $1,000 would sting, but it changes nothing structural. Your percentages will differ; the shape shouldn't — the bot's slice comes last, after the money with bigger jobs is protected.
Should the slice be a percentage or a dollar amount?
Write it down in dollars — percentages quietly move the boundary every time the market does. "10% of my portfolio" grows in a rally, handing the bot more money precisely when everything feels safest, and shrinks in a crash without any decision from you. "The bot manages $1,000" is unambiguous: you always know exactly what's at risk, and changing it requires a deliberate act rather than a market mood. Revisit the dollar figure on a schedule — quarterly is plenty — and adjust it consciously if your finances change. The whole point of the boundary is that only you move it, on purpose.
