Gradient Boosting

What’s the Price of Monotonicity? A Multi-Dataset Benchmark of Monotone-Constrained Gradient Boosting for Credit PD ArXiv ID: 2512.17945 “View on arXiv” Authors: Petr Koklev Abstract Financial institutions face a trade-off between predictive accuracy and interpretability when deploying machine learning models for credit risk. Monotonicity constraints align model behavior with domain knowledge, but their performance cost - the price of monotonicity - is not well quantified. This paper benchmarks monotone-constrained versus unconstrained gradient boosting models for credit probability of default across five public datasets and three libraries. We define the Price of Monotonicity (PoM) as the relative change in standard performance metrics when moving from unconstrained to constrained models, estimated via paired comparisons with bootstrap uncertainty. In our experiments, PoM in AUC ranges from essentially zero to about 2.9 percent: constraints are almost costless on large datasets (typically less than 0.2 percent, often indistinguishable from zero) and most costly on smaller datasets with extensive constraint coverage (around 2-3 percent). Thus, appropriately specified monotonicity constraints can often deliver interpretability with small accuracy losses, particularly in large-scale credit portfolios. ...

Integration of LSTM Networks in Random Forest Algorithms for Stock Market Trading Predictions ArXiv ID: 2512.02036 “View on arXiv” Authors: Juan C. King, Jose M. Amigo Abstract The aim of this paper is the analysis and selection of stock trading systems that combine different models with data of different nature, such as financial and microeconomic information. Specifically, based on previous work by the authors and applying advanced techniques of Machine Learning and Deep Learning, our objective is to formulate trading algorithms for the stock market with empirically tested statistical advantages, thus improving results published in the literature. Our approach integrates Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM) networks with algorithms based on decision trees, such as Random Forest and Gradient Boosting. While the former analyze price patterns of financial assets, the latter are fed with economic data of companies. Numerical simulations of algorithmic trading with data from international companies and 10-weekday predictions confirm that an approach based on both fundamental and technical variables can outperform the usual approaches, which do not combine those two types of variables. In doing so, Random Forest turned out to be the best performer among the decision trees. We also discuss how the prediction performance of such a hybrid approach can be boosted by selecting the technical variables. ...

Machine Learning vs. Randomness: Challenges in Predicting Binary Options Movements ArXiv ID: 2511.15960 “View on arXiv” Authors: Gabriel M. Arantes, Richard F. Pinto, Bruno L. Dalmazo, Eduardo N. Borges, Giancarlo Lucca, Viviane L. D. de Mattos, Fabian C. Cardoso, Rafael A. Berri Abstract Binary options trading is often marketed as a field where predictive models can generate consistent profits. However, the inherent randomness and stochastic nature of binary options make price movements highly unpredictable, posing significant challenges for any forecasting approach. This study demonstrates that machine learning algorithms struggle to outperform a simple baseline in predicting binary options movements. Using a dataset of EUR/USD currency pairs from 2021 to 2023, we tested multiple models, including Random Forest, Logistic Regression, Gradient Boosting, and k-Nearest Neighbors (kNN), both before and after hyperparameter optimization. Furthermore, several neural network architectures, including Multi-Layer Perceptrons (MLP) and a Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM) network, were evaluated under different training conditions. Despite these exhaustive efforts, none of the models surpassed the ZeroR baseline accuracy, highlighting the inherent randomness of binary options. These findings reinforce the notion that binary options lack predictable patterns, making them unsuitable for machine learning-based forecasting. ...

Advancing Exchange Rate Forecasting: Leveraging Machine Learning and AI for Enhanced Accuracy in Global Financial Markets ArXiv ID: 2506.09851 “View on arXiv” Authors: Md. Yeasin Rahat, Rajan Das Gupta, Nur Raisa Rahman, Sudipto Roy Pritom, Samiur Rahman Shakir, Md Imrul Hasan Showmick, Md. Jakir Hossen Abstract The prediction of foreign exchange rates, such as the US Dollar (USD) to Bangladeshi Taka (BDT), plays a pivotal role in global financial markets, influencing trade, investments, and economic stability. This study leverages historical USD/BDT exchange rate data from 2018 to 2023, sourced from Yahoo Finance, to develop advanced machine learning models for accurate forecasting. A Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM) neural network is employed, achieving an exceptional accuracy of 99.449%, a Root Mean Square Error (RMSE) of 0.9858, and a test loss of 0.8523, significantly outperforming traditional methods like ARIMA (RMSE 1.342). Additionally, a Gradient Boosting Classifier (GBC) is applied for directional prediction, with backtesting on a $10,000 initial capital revealing a 40.82% profitable trade rate, though resulting in a net loss of $20,653.25 over 49 trades. The study analyzes historical trends, showing a decline in BDT/USD rates from 0.012 to 0.009, and incorporates normalized daily returns to capture volatility. These findings highlight the potential of deep learning in forex forecasting, offering traders and policymakers robust tools to mitigate risks. Future work could integrate sentiment analysis and real-time economic indicators to further enhance model adaptability in volatile markets. ...

Evaluating Credit VIX (CDS IV) Prediction Methods with Incremental Batch Learning ArXiv ID: 2408.15404 “View on arXiv” Authors: Unknown Abstract This paper presents the experimental process and results of SVM, Gradient Boosting, and an Attention-GRU Hybrid model in predicting the Implied Volatility of rolled-over five-year spread contracts of credit default swaps (CDS) on European corporate debt during the quarter following mid-May ‘24, as represented by the iTraxx/Cboe Europe Main 1-Month Volatility Index (BP Volatility). The analysis employs a feature matrix inspired by Merton’s determinants of default probability. Our comparative assessment aims to identify strengths in SOTA and classical machine learning methods for financial risk prediction ...

Unveiling the Impact of Macroeconomic Policies: A Double Machine Learning Approach to Analyzing Interest Rate Effects on Financial Markets ArXiv ID: 2404.07225 “View on arXiv” Authors: Unknown Abstract This study examines the effects of macroeconomic policies on financial markets using a novel approach that combines Machine Learning (ML) techniques and causal inference. It focuses on the effect of interest rate changes made by the US Federal Reserve System (FRS) on the returns of fixed income and equity funds between January 1986 and December 2021. The analysis makes a distinction between actively and passively managed funds, hypothesizing that the latter are less susceptible to changes in interest rates. The study contrasts gradient boosting and linear regression models using the Double Machine Learning (DML) framework, which supports a variety of statistical learning techniques. Results indicate that gradient boosting is a useful tool for predicting fund returns; for example, a 1% increase in interest rates causes an actively managed fund’s return to decrease by -11.97%. This understanding of the relationship between interest rates and fund performance provides opportunities for additional research and insightful, data-driven advice for fund managers and investors ...

DeRisk: An Effective Deep Learning Framework for Credit Risk Prediction over Real-World Financial Data ArXiv ID: 2308.03704 “View on arXiv” Authors: Unknown Abstract Despite the tremendous advances achieved over the past years by deep learning techniques, the latest risk prediction models for industrial applications still rely on highly handtuned stage-wised statistical learning tools, such as gradient boosting and random forest methods. Different from images or languages, real-world financial data are high-dimensional, sparse, noisy and extremely imbalanced, which makes deep neural network models particularly challenging to train and fragile in practice. In this work, we propose DeRisk, an effective deep learning risk prediction framework for credit risk prediction on real-world financial data. DeRisk is the first deep risk prediction model that outperforms statistical learning approaches deployed in our company’s production system. We also perform extensive ablation studies on our method to present the most critical factors for the empirical success of DeRisk. ...