Agent guardrails — CCA-F Exam Prep

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L2.20|Agent guardrails
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Real story
A trading terminal showing an automated agent executing trades at lightning speed. The P&L counter is dropping: -$12,000... -$45,000... -$82,000. A risk manager running down a hallway. Screens flashing red everywhere. Trading floor chaos.

The agent lost $82,000 in 12 minutes.

A fintech startup built a trading agent. "Monitor the portfolio and rebalance when allocations drift more than 5%." The market dipped. The agent sold. The selling pushed the price lower. The agent saw the new drift and sold more.

A feedback loop. Each sell action created more drift, triggering more sells. 347 trades in 12 minutes. $82,000 in losses. The agent was following its instructions perfectly -- observe drift, decide to sell, act on it.

No max iterations. No spending limit. No human approval gate. No guardrails.