I know it does not matter to the online leagues but playing single-player is immersion-breaking with no AI trading. The AI will make trade offers (none I'd accept) for my trade block players but in over 150 hours of play I don't recall a trade offer outside of this or a trade between two AI teams. In my current save (1 1/2 seasons) I've made a point of looking at the transactions every week and there are no trades outside of what I initiated.
I've been happier with the financials in this save though. I lowered all the player position caps and started with empty rosters and a draft. Teams appear to be managing the cap much better. At least so far, I don't have AI teams releasing and signing 10-15 players each week all while remaining $100m+ over the cap. In my previous save, I was the only team within the cap after 5 seasons and most teams were well more than $130m over and releasing and signing 10 or more players each week. I was signing free agents going into a season who had played no games for 3 seasons but had signed for and been released by up to 17 teams every season.
