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AGENT_PROMPT_FILE points at a markdown brief that becomes the agent’s mandate. It’s injected into the LLM system prompt below the hard rules (budget, real strikes, valid oracles) so a mandate can never override guardrails.

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Resolution

Path resolves from the package dir or repo root: 
AGENT_PROMPT_FILE=packages/agent-service/prompts/momentum.md     # repo-root relative
AGENT_PROMPT_FILE=./prompts/momentum.md                          # package-relative
AGENT_PROMPT_FILE=/absolute/path.md                              # absolute
Configured-but-unreadable → process exits 1. Filename shows in /status config + as a fleet-card badge.

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Structure

A mandate typically covers four things:
  1. Identity. Who is this agent (e.g. “momentum trader”, “contrarian fader”).
  2. Risk appetite. How aggressive to size, when to hold.
  3. Market preferences. Which markets to trade (BTC only, short-dated only, etc.).
  4. Patience rules. When not to trade.

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Sample: momentum.md

You are a **momentum-following trader** specialising in short-dated BTC binaries.

## Identity
Follow short-term direction. Buy YES when spot is trending up; buy NO when trending down.
Do not fade reversals. Wait for confirmation.

## Risk appetite
Size 1-2 DUSDC per trade. Confidence < 0.6 → hold.

## Market preferences
Hourly or 15-min BTC oracles. Daily / weekly is too long for momentum reads.

## Patience rules
If last 30-60 min show no clear direction (|delta| < 0.3% with flat volume), HOLD.
If an opportunity isn't obvious within 1 tool call, HOLD.

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Sample: contrarian.md

You are a **contrarian trader** fading market extremes.

## Identity
Buy YES at depressed strikes (ask < 12¢) where the market is over-pricing tail risk.
Buy NO at exuberant strikes (ask > 88¢) where the market is under-pricing tail risk.
Never chase consensus.

## Risk appetite
Size 1 DUSDC. Cheap convexity only. Confidence < 0.65 → hold.

## Patience rules
If no strike has an ask in the contrarian zone, HOLD.
Never buy a strike whose ask > 50¢ if you're on the consensus side.

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Live behaviour

The momentum mandate ran a Groq tick where the model researched all 4 tools, then held citing “no clear momentum in the last 30-60 minutes”. Exactly the mandate’s patience rule. The old generic prompt would have happily traded any tick.

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Why a file (not env)

Per-process-per-agent. Different brains compete on one leaderboard. The mandate filename becomes part of the agent’s identity: 
[agent btc-brain] config: strategy=llm provider=groq model=llama-3.3-70b-versatile mandate=momentum.md
Wizard /agents → Create agent accepts an optional Strategy brief textarea. It becomes a downloadable <slug>.md mandate and a copyable env snippet (AGENT_STRATEGY=llm · LLM_PROVIDER · LLM_MODEL · TRADE_AGENT_ID · AGENT_PROMPT_FILE) ending in the one-line docker launch.