An Incomplete Combined is a Combined that holds fewer than two strategies — in practice, one. A Combined's job is to split capital between several strategies, so with one there is nothing to combine: it cannot be backtested, and its results pages show example results instead of its own. It is a normal, temporary state.
How does Fincanva handle it?
- The threshold is two: at two or more strategies the Combined runs normally; below two it does not run at all, because one strategy would receive all the capital and the Combined layer would add nothing.
- Its run control is disabled everywhere it appears, with the reason "Add one more strategy to run this Combined." The block applies to every run entry point — the editor's run control and the results page's re-run alike — and reacts to an add or remove immediately, before you save.
- Having never run, it has no run status history and no result to fall back on. The block is the Combined's own gate, not one of the setup checks strategy alerts cover.
- Adding or removing strategies is still fully allowed; only running is blocked. The library list marks it with an Incomplete badge and shows the same reason on its run action.
What does it look like in practice?
You create a Combined and seed it with your momentum strategy. The library list shows it with an Incomplete badge, and its run control is disabled: "Add one more strategy to run this Combined." You open its analysis anyway and see a complete-looking results page — an equity curve, a metrics table, a monthly grid — under the eyebrow Example results and the headline "This is what a complete Combined shows". None of those numbers are yours; they are the sample's, shown so you can see what you will get. You add a second strategy, a defensive one. The badge disappears, the run control unlocks, and the first real backtest replaces the example with numbers computed from your two strategies and the Combined-level split between them.
Do the Combined-level settings do anything while it is Incomplete?
No — nothing you set at the Combined level is used while the Combined holds fewer than two strategies. An Incomplete Combined never runs, and one strategy would receive all the capital anyway, so there is no split to apply. The Combined-level capital split and the Combined risk layer still render, and you can edit and save them as before; they begin applying as soon as a second strategy is added.
The app states this above those settings. The notice is titled "The Combined has only one strategy" ("The Combined has no strategies" when it holds none), and reads "Splitting the capital takes at least 2: until then these settings aren't used. Add the missing strategies in the Strategies card."
What do "Example results" show?
The results pages of an Incomplete Combined show a real, fully rendered results layout filled with a fixed sample Combined's numbers, faded and non-interactive behind a prompt. The eyebrow reads Example results, the headline "This is what a complete Combined shows", and the body "Add one more strategy to run this Combined.", with an Add a strategy button. The numbers on screen belong to the sample, not to your strategy — nothing there was computed from your settings, and the page's own controls do nothing while the example is showing.
A results section that has no sample to preview falls back to the plain "No results yet" empty state, carrying the same explanation. Positions behaves the same way as the analysis pages.
How does a Combined become Incomplete?
Two ways, and neither changes what the strategy is:
- Created and not yet filled. Combine, on a single strategy's workspace, opens the Combined builder seeded with that strategy, and the Combined it produces starts Incomplete until you add the second. The Combined strategy tile in the Create new dialog arrives from the other side: it creates a Combined holding one empty member and drops you inside it, so that one starts Incomplete too. It refuses only when you own no strategies at all.
- Reduced to one. Removing strategies until one is left leaves an Incomplete Combined; it is not converted back into a single strategy. Being a Combined is a property of the strategy itself, not a count.
A Combined always keeps at least one strategy inside it, so its last one cannot be removed — the floor is one, which is exactly the Incomplete state.