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+# Scanner Improvements Design
+
+**Date:** 2026-02-18
+**Status:** Approved
+
+## Problem
+
+Most scanners produce weak or broken signals:
+- Insider buying drops transaction details (name, title, value)
+- Options flow ignores its own premium filter, only checks nearest expiration
+- Volume accumulation can't distinguish buying from selling
+- Reddit DD scores posts with an LLM then ignores the score
+- Semantic news is just regex extraction, not semantic
+- Market movers finds stocks after they moved
+- ML signal threshold (35%) is worse than a coin flip
+
+Three useful scanner types are missing entirely: analyst upgrades, technical breakouts, sector rotation.
+
+## Phase 1: Fix Existing Scanners
+
+### 1. Insider Buying
+- Preserve `insider_name`, `title`, `transaction_value`, `shares` from scraper
+- Priority by significance: CEO/CFO >$100K = CRITICAL, director >$50K = HIGH, other = MEDIUM
+- Cluster detection: 2+ insiders buying same stock within 14 days = CRITICAL
+- Rich context: "CFO Jane Smith purchased $250K of shares"
+
+### 2. Options Flow
+- Apply the existing `min_premium` threshold ($25K) — currently configured but never checked
+- Scan up to 3 nearest expirations instead of 1
+- Classify moneyness: ITM call buying (conviction) > OTM (speculative)
+- Weight by expiration: 30+ DTE scored higher than weeklies
+
+### 3. Volume Accumulation
+- Price-change filter: volume >2x AND absolute price change <3% (quiet accumulation only)
+- Multi-day mode: 3 of last 5 days >1.5x average = sustained accumulation
+- Exclude distribution: high volume + big price drop = skip
+
+### 4. Reddit DD
+- Use LLM quality score for priority: 80+ = HIGH, 60-79 = MEDIUM, <60 = skip
+- Subreddit weighting: r/investing bonus, r/pennystocks penalty
+- Include post title and LLM score in context
+
+### 5. Reddit Trending
+- Add mention count to context: "47 mentions in 6hrs"
+- Priority by volume: 50+ = HIGH, 20-49 = MEDIUM
+- Basic sentiment check from available data
+
+### 6. Semantic News
+- Include actual headline text in context (not just "Mentioned in recent market news")
+- Catalyst classification from headline keywords: upgrade/FDA/acquisition/earnings
+- Priority based on catalyst type
+
+### 7. Earnings Calendar
+- Add historical earnings reaction via `get_pre_earnings_accumulation_signal()`
+- Include EPS/revenue estimates from `get_ticker_earnings_estimate()`
+- Priority: proximity + accumulation signal = CRITICAL
+
+### 8. Market Movers
+- Market cap filter: exclude <$300M
+- Volume validation: require avg volume >500K
+- Include change percentage in context
+- Cross-reference with news for catalyst attribution
+
+### 9. ML Signal
+- Raise `min_win_prob` default from 0.35 to 0.50
+- Log model metadata (version, training date) if available
+- Add feature importances to context when model exposes them
+
+## Phase 2: New Scanners
+
+### 10. Analyst Upgrades Scanner
+- Uses existing `get_analyst_rating_changes()` from `alpha_vantage_analysts.py`
+- Filters for upgrades, initiations, price target increases from last 3 days
+- Priority: upgrade with >20% target increase = HIGH, initiation = MEDIUM
+- Strategy: `analyst_upgrade`
+
+### 11. Technical Breakout Scanner
+- Uses yfinance OHLCV data (no new APIs)
+- Detects: volume-confirmed breakout above 20-day high, or 52-week high on 2x+ volume
+- Priority: 3x+ volume at breakout = HIGH, 2x+ = MEDIUM
+- Strategy: `momentum` (reuses existing enum)
+
+### 12. Sector Rotation Scanner
+- Compares sector ETF relative strength: 5-day vs 20-day periods
+- Flags individual stocks in accelerating sectors that haven't moved yet
+- Uses yfinance sector ETFs (XLK, XLF, XLE, etc.)
+- Strategy: new `sector_rotation` enum value
+
+## Data Sources
+
+All improvements use existing APIs:
+- yfinance (free, no key)
+- Alpha Vantage (existing key)
+- Finnhub (existing key)
+- OpenInsider scraping (existing)
+- Reddit PRAW (existing)
+
+No new API subscriptions required.