Version: Current

Balance watch: 2026-10-21

Historical, as of 2026-10-21. This is one dated balance-watch ledger. The balances, account names and flags below are what a run saw on 2026-10-21 and have not been re-measured; run tools/balance-watch.sh for current balances.

Owner directive: “keep an eye on balances … ask me if anything needs recharging.”

This is the standing answer. tools/balance-watch.sh collects every prepaid balance the estate can read, the acumen spend ledger, and the known expiry clocks, writes a dated ledger, and raises one of three flags per row. It does not recharge anything: a run that reports RECHARGE means the operator gets asked, not that money moved.

Last run in this document: 2026-10-21T22:50:59Z from edge, exit 1 (two recharges outstanding, three rows a human must resolve).

What it reads

Row	Source	Where the key lives	How it is used
DeepSeek direct balance	`GET api.deepseek.com/user/balance`	`~/.secrets/deepseek-api-key` on edge (path only)	curl reads the header from its config stream (`-K -`), so the value never reaches argv
OpenRouter credits	`GET openrouter.ai/api/v1/credits`	`OPENROUTER_API_KEY` in the acumen env file on tcp	the request is executed on tcp over ssh; only provider JSON comes back
acumen spend ledger	loopback `GET /v1/router/keys` and `GET /metrics`	operator admin key on tcp	read on tcp; the key never crosses the ssh boundary
Expiry calendar	static table in the script	—	dates resolved against the run date

Credential values are never printed, logged, put on a command line, or written into the ledger. The script reads key files by path; the two remote values are read only by the remote shell that already owns them.

Flags and exit codes

Flag	Meaning
OK	balance at or above the low threshold (default $5)
RECHARGE	balance below the threshold, or a renewal falls inside the horizon (default 14 days)
HUMAN-CHECK	the number or the clock could not be established — never silently OK

Exit 0 all rows OK · 3 no recharge but at least one human check (cannot certify) · 1 at least one recharge · 2 usage error.

The rule behind that table: a watcher that reports OK when it cannot read a number is worse than no watcher. Every unavailable source becomes HUMAN-CHECK, and the caveat list says which source failed.

Standing recharge priority

Ranked by when a human has to act, not by balance size.

#	Account	Figure	Flag	Why it is ranked here	Ask
1	Minimax subscription seat (`MINIMAX_API_KEY` on acumen)	expires 2026-10-22 (1 day)	RECHARGE	no balance API; the seat simply lapses	renew or drop — decide before tomorrow
2	Fireworks	$1.00 stored balance	RECHARGE	under threshold; the 2026-10-20 upstream probe answered 412 (funding) on this seat	top up, or disable the seat so it stops being a candidate
3	Ollama Cloud subscription	$60/mo non-rolling credit, no balance endpoint	HUMAN-CHECK	the provider enforces the credit itself; no local poller exists by design (decision D3)	confirm the subscription is still wanted at renewal
4	DeepSeek direct (edge key)	$22.39 live	OK	healthy, but it is the key this fleet’s own agents run on, so it moves during a working day	none today
5	OpenRouter	$14.29 remaining of $15.00 granted, $0.71 used	OK	healthy; also the prepaid seat acumen last polled cleanly	none
6	DeepInfra	$10.00 stored balance	OK	acumen last-polled figure, not a live provider read	none, but see gaps
7	Charm	no balance figure — $2.04 observed spend	OK (not a balance)	spend-only provider in the acumen ledger	none
8	Groq	no balance figure — $0.0001 observed spend	OK (not a balance)	free tier; spend is rounding noise	none

Consumer keys (the acumen key list, 9 keys) are all at cap: $0.0973 today and month-to-date, 0.2% of the 50 USD monthly cap on the only key that has moved (edge-orchestrator). No consumer key is near a cap, so no cap-driven recharge is pending.

Expiry calendar

Item	Date	Days left	Flag	Note
Minimax subscription seat	2026-10-22	1	RECHARGE	renew or drop before it lapses
DeepSeek search/fetch free window	2026-10-31	10	HUMAN-CHECK	the v1/tools/search and v1/tools/fetch endpoints leave free preview; $0.75 per 1,000 calls after. Decide whether the door keeps using them
OVH trial (30 days)	unknown	n/a	HUMAN-CHECK	the 30-day clock exists, its start date is recorded nowhere on the fleet
Cerebras trial (30 days)	unknown	n/a	HUMAN-CHECK	Cerebras grants a 30-day trial and no Cerebras key exists on the estate yet

The horizon is 14 days by default (--horizon). A dated renewal inside the horizon is RECHARGE; a dated price change or an undated trial is HUMAN-CHECK, because neither one is a top-up.

The ledger this produced

balance-watch 2026-10-21T22:50:59Z  (edge)
remote: tcp [ok]   thresholds: low $5, horizon 14 days
VERDICT  ask the operator: 2 recharge, 3 human check

BALANCES
  PROVIDER         REMAINING  FLAG        SOURCE
  deepseek             22.39  OK          api.deepseek.com/user/balance
  openrouter           14.29  OK          openrouter.ai/api/v1/credits
  deepinfra            10.00  OK          acumen:/metrics (stored poll)
  fireworks             1.00  RECHARGE    acumen:/metrics (stored poll)

STORED-POLL DRIFT (acumen figure beside the live provider figure)
  deepseek        live $ 22.39   stored poll $  3.13   (stale; the live figure wins)

SPEND (acumen observed, not a balance)
  charm           $2.0400
  deepinfra       $0.2500
  opencode-go     $0.0800
  ollama-cloud    $0.0600
  deepseek        $0.0500
  opencode-go-2   $0.0100
  groq            $0.0000

CONSUMER KEYS
  9 keys · today $0.0973 · this month $0.0973
  NAME                                           DAY     MONTH    CAP/MO  LAST-USED
  open-webui-rerot2                           0.0000    0.0000        50  2026-10-21T21:46:46
  acumen-operator-admin-20261020T195252Z      0.0000    0.0000         0  2026-10-21T22:50:59
  hindsight-reflect                           0.0000    0.0000        50  2026-10-21T00:05:44
  console-20261020T182707Z                    0.0000    0.0000         0  2026-10-21T22:50:56
  edge-orchestrator                           0.0973    0.0973        50  2026-10-21T22:50:52
  openviking-vlm                              0.0000    0.0000        50  2026-10-21T22:50:58
  hindsight-core                              0.0000    0.0000        50  2026-10-20T18:29:25
  dsh-platform                                0.0000    0.0000       500  2026-10-20T20:21:05
  acumen-operator-admin                       0.0000    0.0000         0  2026-10-20T19:53:21

EXPIRY CALENDAR
  ITEM                              DATE         DAYS  FLAG        NOTE
  minimax subscription seat         2026-10-22      1  RECHARGE    MINIMAX_API_KEY seat on acumen; renew or drop before it lapses
  DeepSeek search/fetch free window 2026-10-31     10  HUMAN-CHECK /v1/tools/search and /v1/tools/fetch leave free preview; $0.75 per 1,000 calls after
  OVH trial (30 days)               unknown       n/a  HUMAN-CHECK 30-day trial clock; the start date is not recorded on the estate
  Cerebras trial (30 days)          unknown       n/a  HUMAN-CHECK Cerebras grants a 30-day trial and no Cerebras key exists on the estate yet

FLAGS  OK 3 · RECHARGE 2 · HUMAN-CHECK 3

CAVEATS
  - acumen /metrics carries 228 balance rows, most of them 0 for seats that are never polled; only non-zero rows are carried here
  - the stored deepseek balance is acumen-owned last-poll state, not the provider reading; the live row wins

The JSON twin is reports/balance-watch/2026-10-21.json (schema: "balance-watch/1"). Every row carries provider, remaining_usd, flag and source; expiries carry days_left and kind. No credential appears in either file.

Gaps and drift this run found

The acumen deepseek balance is stale by ~$19. Acumen’s stored poll says $3.13; the provider says $22.39. The stored figure is acumen’s last poll, not a provider reading, so the watcher prints both and trusts the live one. Any budget display that reads only the metrics endpoint is understating available credit on this seat by a factor of seven.
228 of acumen’s balance rows are zero and unpolled. Only non-zero rows are carried; zero means “never polled” for most seats, not “empty”. A zero row must never be read as a warning, and a non-zero row must never be read as current unless its provider is one of the two live sources.
The direct DeepSeek balance moved during collection: $22.87 → $22.51 → $22.39 across 22:46–22:50Z. This agent session itself runs on that key, so the measurement is partly self-inflicted. Acknowledge the direction, do not extrapolate a daily burn from a five-minute window.
Fireworks is the only seat flagged for money, and it is not a polling gap: the 2026-10-20 upstream probe returned 412 (funding) on it, so the $1.00 is a real ceiling rather than a stale number.
No Cerebras or OVH credential exists on the estate. Their trial clocks cannot be computed from any host; the table says so instead of inventing a date.

Running it

tools/balance-watch.sh                 # default: tcp remote, $5 low, 14-day horizon
tools/balance-watch.sh --low 10        # raise the recharge threshold
tools/balance-watch.sh --out-dir /var/tmp/balance-watch

Overrides: BALANCE_HOST (ssh target; empty disables every remote row and turns them into HUMAN-CHECK), BALANCE_DEEPSEEK_KEY, BALANCE_ACUMEN_ENV, BALANCE_ACUMEN_ADMIN_KEY, BALANCE_ACUMEN_BASE, BALANCE_OUT_DIR, BALANCE_LOW_USD, BALANCE_HORIZON_DAYS.

Not installed: no timer or cron entry was created for this. The watcher is run on demand; scheduling it is a separate decision, and a timer that mails on exit 1 would be the natural next step if the operator wants to stop running it by hand.

Gate

bash -n, shellcheck -x (0.10.0, zero findings), and the harness gate (npm run verify) all pass on this branch; see the PR for the exit codes.