SignalFrogThe score is additionally translated into four states. They carry the frog's temperature metaphor and have fixed thresholds:
| State | Score | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| Cold | 0–30 | Low risk, markets stable |
| Warm | 31–41 | Elevated, watch closely |
| Hot | 42–58 | High risk, consider a response |
| Boiling | above 58 | Critical |
Why states and not just the number
Numbers invite false precision. The difference between 46 and 48 is meaningless within the model's measurement accuracy — the difference between "warm" and "hot" is not.
States force the question that actually matters: has the situation changed categorically, or is the number merely noisy?
Where the thresholds come from
They are not rounded but calibrated from historical data — the unusual boundaries at 42 and 58 are the result of that calibration, not of aesthetics. The backtest across 3,872 trading days documents how they came about and where they could not be tested cleanly.
The frog behind it
The metaphor is deliberate. The story of the frog in slowly heating water describes exactly the problem at hand: it is not the sudden shock that is dangerous but the gradual shift nobody notices, because every single step was small.