A learning-guided multi-objective evolutionary algorithm for constrained portfolio optimization

Portfolio optimization involves the optimal assignment of limited capital to different available financial assets to achieve a reasonable trade-off between profit and risk objectives. In this paper, we studied the extended Markowitz's mean-variance portfolio optimization model. We considered the cardinality, quantity, pre-assignment and round lot constraints in the extended model. These four real-world constraints limit the number of assets in a portfolio, restrict the minimum and maximum proportions of assets held in the portfolio, require some specific assets to be included in the portfolio and require to invest the assets in units of a certain size respectively. An efficient learning-guided hybrid multi-objective evolutionary algorithm is proposed to solve the constrained portfolio optimization problem in the extended mean-variance framework. A learning-guided solution generation strategy is incorporated into the multi-objective optimization process to promote the efficient convergence by guiding the evolutionary search towards the promising regions of the search space. The proposed algorithm is compared against four existing state-of-the-art multi-objective evolutionary algorithms, namely Non-dominated Sorting Genetic Algorithm (NSGA-II), Strength Pareto Evolutionary Algorithm (SPEA-2), Pareto Envelope-based Selection Algorithm (PESA-II) and Pareto Archived Evolution Strategy (PAES). Computational results are reported for publicly available OR-library datasets from seven market indices involving up to 1318 assets. Experimental results on the constrained portfolio optimization problem demonstrate that the proposed algorithm significantly outperforms the four well-known multi-objective evolutionary algorithms with respect to the quality of obtained efficient frontier in the conducted experiments

Ortalama-varyans portföy optimizasyonunda genetik algoritma uygulamaları üzerine bir literatür araştırması

Mean-variance portfolio optimization model, introduced by Markowitz, provides a fundamental answer to the problem of portfolio management. This model seeks an efficient frontier with the best trade-offs between two conflicting objectives of maximizing return and minimizing risk. The problem of determining an efficient frontier is known to be NP-hard. Due to the complexity of the problem, genetic algorithms have been widely employed by a growing number of researchers to solve this problem. In this study, a literature review of genetic algorithms implementations on mean-variance portfolio optimization is examined from the recent published literature. Main specifications of the problems studied and the specifications of suggested genetic algorithms have been summarized

A survey on financial applications of metaheuristics

Modern heuristics or metaheuristics are optimization algorithms that have been increasingly used during the last decades to support complex decision-making in a number of fields, such as logistics and transportation, telecommunication networks, bioinformatics, finance, and the like. The continuous increase in computing power, together with advancements in metaheuristics frameworks and parallelization strategies, are empowering these types of algorithms as one of the best alternatives to solve rich and real-life combinatorial optimization problems that arise in a number of financial and banking activities. This article reviews some of the works related to the use of metaheuristics in solving both classical and emergent problems in the finance arena. A non-exhaustive list of examples includes rich portfolio optimization, index tracking, enhanced indexation, credit risk, stock investments, financial project scheduling, option pricing, feature selection, bankruptcy and financial distress prediction, and credit risk assessment. This article also discusses some open opportunities for researchers in the field, and forecast the evolution of metaheuristics to include real-life uncertainty conditions into the optimization problems being considered.This work has been partially supported by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (TRA2013-48180-C3-P, TRA2015-71883-REDT), FEDER, and the Universitat Jaume I mobility program (E-2015-36)

Evolutionary approaches for portfolio optimization

Portfolio optimization involves the optimal assignment of limited capital to different available financial assets to achieve a reasonable trade-off between profit and risk objectives. Markowitz’s mean variance (MV) model is widely regarded as the foundation of modern portfolio theory and provides a quantitative framework for portfolio optimization problems. In real market, investors commonly face real-world trading restrictions and it requires that the constructed portfolios have to meet trading constraints. When additional constraints are added to the basic MV model, the problem thus becomes more complex and the exact optimization approaches run into difficulties to deliver solutions within reasonable time for large problem size. By introducing the cardinality constraint alone already transformed the classic quadratic optimization model into a mixed-integer quadratic programming problem which is an NP-hard problem. Evolutionary algorithms, a class of metaheuristics, are one of the known alternatives for optimization problems that are too complex to be solved using deterministic techniques. This thesis focuses on single-period portfolio optimization problems with practical trading constraints and two different risk measures. Four hybrid evolutionary algorithms are presented to efficiently solve these problems with gradually more complex real world constraints. In the first part of the thesis, the mean variance portfolio model is investigated by taking into account real-world constraints. A hybrid evolutionary algorithm (PBILDE) for portfolio optimization with cardinality and quantity constraints is presented. The proposed PBILDE is able to achieve a strong synergetic effect through hybridization of PBIL and DE. A partially guided mutation and an elitist update strategy are proposed in order to promote the efficient convergence of PBILDE. Its effectiveness is evaluated and compared with other existing algorithms over a number of datasets. A multi-objective scatter search with archive (MOSSwA) algorithm for portfolio optimization with cardinality, quantity and pre-assignment constraints is then presented. New subset generations and solution combination methods are proposed to generate efficient and diverse portfolios. A learning-guided multi-objective evolutionary (MODEwAwL) algorithm for the portfolio optimization problems with cardinality, quantity, pre-assignment and round lot constraints is presented. A learning mechanism is introduced in order to extract important features from the set of elite solutions. Problem-specific selection heuristics are introduced in order to identify high-quality solutions with a reduced computational cost. An efficient and effective candidate generation scheme utilizing a learning mechanism, problem specific heuristics and effective direction-based search methods is proposed to guide the search towards the promising regions of the search space. In the second part of the thesis, an alternative risk measure, VaR, is considered. A non-parametric mean-VaR model with six practical trading constraints is investigated. A multi-objective evolutionary algorithm with guided learning (MODE-GL) is presented for the mean-VaR model. Two different variants of DE mutation schemes in the solution generation scheme are proposed in order to promote the exploration of the search towards the least crowded region of the solution space. Experimental results using historical daily financial market data from S &P 100 and S & P 500 indices are presented. When the cardinality constraints are considered, incorporating a learning mechanism significantly promotes the efficient convergence of the search

Portfolio implementation risk management using evolutionary multiobjective optimization

Portfoliomanagementbasedonmean-varianceportfoliooptimizationissubjecttodifferent sources of uncertainty. In addition to those related to the quality of parameter estimates used in the optimization process, investors face a portfolio implementation risk. The potential temporary discrepancybetweentargetandpresentportfolios,causedbytradingstrategies,mayexposeinvestors to undesired risks. This study proposes an evolutionary multiobjective optimization algorithm aiming at regions with solutions more tolerant to these deviations and, therefore, more reliable. The proposed approach incorporates a user’s preference and seeks a fine-grained approximation of the most relevant efficient region. The computational experiments performed in this study are based on a cardinality-constrained problem with investment limits for eight broad-category indexes and 15 years of data. The obtained results show the ability of the proposed approach to address the robustness issue and to support decision making by providing a preferred part of the efficient set. The results reveal that the obtained solutions also exhibit a higher tolerance to prediction errors in asset returns and variance–covariance matrix.Sandra Garcia-Rodriguez and David Quintana acknowledge financial support granted by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitivity under grant ENE2014-56126-C2-2-R. Roman Denysiuk and Antonio Gaspar-Cunha were supported by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology under grant PEst-C/CTM/LA0025/2013 (Projecto Estratégico-LA 25-2013-2014-Strategic Project-LA 25-2013-2014).info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio