Review of Nature-Inspired Forecast Combination Techniques

Effective and efficient planning in various areas can be significantly supported by forecasting a variable like an economy growth rate or product demand numbers for a future point in time. More than one forecast for the same variable is often available, leading to the question whether one should choose one of the single models or combine several of them to obtain a forecast with improved accuracy. In the almost 40 years of research in the area of forecast combination, an impressive amount of work has been done. This paper reviews forecast combination techniques that are nonlinear and have in some way been inspired by nature

Co-evolution vs. Neural Networks; An Evaluation of UK Risky Money

The performance of a "capital certain" Divisia index constructed using the same components included in the Bank of England"s MSI plus national savings; a "risky" Divisia index constructed by adding bonds, shares and unit trusts to the list of assets included in the first index; and a capital certain simple sum index for comparison is compared. nce suggests that co-evolutionary strategies are superior to neural networks in the majority of cases. The risky money index performs at least as well as the Bank of England Divisia index when combined with interest rate information. Notably, the provision of long term interest rates improves the out-of-sample forecasting performance of the Bank of England Divisia index in all cases examinedEvolutionary Strategies, Risk Adjusted Divisia, Inflation, Neural Networks

Forecasting and Forecast Combination in Airline Revenue Management Applications

Predicting a variable for a future point in time helps planning for unknown future situations and is common practice in many areas such as economics, finance, manufacturing, weather and natural sciences. This paper investigates and compares approaches to forecasting and forecast combination that can be applied to service industry in general and to airline industry in particular. Furthermore, possibilities to include additionally available data like passenger-based information are discussed

Schumpeterian Dynamics and Financial Market Anomalies

In this paper we try to put together both the dynamics of the endogenous evolution of an industry and the corresponding dynamics on the capital market. The first module of our modelling efforts is the endogenous evolution of the industry based on the micro-behaviour of boundedly rational agents. They strive to undertake entrepreneurial actions and found new firms. Thereby, the role of knowledge diffusion is emphasized. The second module, the capital market module, will also be represented by boundedly rational agents. They read the data of the real side of the economy – induced by the real economy module – interact with other investors and eventually derive their investment decisions. The cognitive process will be modelled using a neural network approach.neural networks, financial markets, entrepreneurship, endogenous evolution

Incorporating prior financial domain knowledge into neural networks for implied volatility surface prediction

In this paper we develop a novel neural network model for predicting implied volatility surface. Prior financial domain knowledge is taken into account. A new activation function that incorporates volatility smile is proposed, which is used for the hidden nodes that process the underlying asset price. In addition, financial conditions, such as the absence of arbitrage, the boundaries and the asymptotic slope, are embedded into the loss function. This is one of the very first studies which discuss a methodological framework that incorporates prior financial domain knowledge into neural network architecture design and model training. The proposed model outperforms the benchmarked models with the option data on the S&P 500 index over 20 years. More importantly, the domain knowledge is satisfied empirically, showing the model is consistent with the existing financial theories and conditions related to implied volatility surface.Comment: 8 pages, SIGKDD 202

Dynamic Factor Model and Artificial Neural Network Models: To Combine Forecasts or Combine Models?

In this chapter, we evaluate the forecasting performance of the model combination and forecast combination of the dynamic factor model (DFM) and the artificial neural networks (ANNs). For the model combination, the factors that are extracted from a large dataset are used as additional input to the ANN model that produces the factor-augmented artificial neural network (FAANN). Linear and nonlinear forecasts combining methods are used to combine the DFM and the ANN forecasts. The results of the best combining method are compared to the forecasts result of the FAANN model. The models are applied to forecast three time series variables using large South African monthly data. The out-of-sample root-mean-square error (RMSE) results show that the FAANN model yields substantial improvement over the individual and best combined forecasts from the DFM and ANN forecasting models and the autoregressive AR benchmark model. Further, the Diebold-Mariano test results also confirm the superiority of the FAANN model forecast’s performance over the AR benchmark model and the combined forecasts

Machine Learning Stock Market Prediction Studies: Review and Research Directions

Stock market investment strategies are complex and rely on an evaluation of vast amounts of data. In recent years, machine learning techniques have increasingly been examined to assess whether they can improve market forecasting when compared with traditional approaches. The objective for this study is to identify directions for future machine learning stock market prediction research based upon a review of current literature. A systematic literature review methodology is used to identify relevant peer-reviewed journal articles from the past twenty years and categorize studies that have similar methods and contexts. Four categories emerge: artificial neural network studies, support vector machine studies, studies using genetic algorithms combined with other techniques, and studies using hybrid or other artificial intelligence approaches. Studies in each category are reviewed to identify common findings, unique findings, limitations, and areas that need further investigation. The final section provides overall conclusions and directions for future research

Encountered Problems of Time Series with Neural Networks: Models and Architectures

The growing interest in the development of forecasting applications with neural networks is denoted by the publication of more than 10,000 research articles present in the literature. However, the high number of factors included in the configuration of the network, the training process, validation and forecasting, and the sample of data, which must be determined in order to achieve an adequate network model for forecasting, converts neural networks in an unstable technique, given that any change in training or in some parameter produces great changes in the prediction. In this chapter, an analysis of the problematic around the factors that affect the construction of the neural network models is made and that often present inconsistent results, and the fields that require additional research are highlighted

Financial time series modelling with hybrid model based on customized RBF neural network combined with genetic algorithm

In this paper, authors apply feed-forward artificial neural network (ANN) of RBF type into the process of modelling and forecasting the future value of USD/CAD time series. Authors test the customized version of the RBF and add the evolutionary approach into it. They also combine the standard algorithm for adapting weights in neural network with an unsupervised clustering algorithm called K-means. Finally, authors suggest the new hybrid model as a combination of a standard ANN and a moving average for error modeling that is used to enhance the outputs of the network using the error part of the original RBF. Using high-frequency data, they examine the ability to forecast exchange rate values for the horizon of one day. To determine the forecasting efficiency, authors perform the comparative out-of-sample analysis of the suggested hybrid model with statistical models and the standard neural network