Kaggle competitions offer valuable insights for business forecasting.
problem Lack of attention to Kaggle competitions in academic forecasting studies.
method Review of results from six Kaggle competitions featuring real-life business forecasting tasks.
result Global ensemble models outperform local single models in Kaggle competitions.
Sentiment analysis (SA) is a task related to understanding people's feelings in written text; the starting point would be to identify the polarity level (positive, neutral or negative) of a given text, moving on to identify emotions or whether a text is humorous or not. This task has been the subject of several researc…
The study compares M6 competitors' performance to industry benchmarks and discusses incentives for investment managers.
problem Investors seek to understand the performance and skill of M6 competitors beyond the competition's metrics.
method Comparative analysis using financial metrics, factor models, and new strategies.
result Most competitors do not generate significant out-performance compared to industry benchmarks, but some show skill in recent performance.
The goal of this study is to determine which strategic model, either IO or RBV, allows firms to generate the highest performance on a competitive market. Contrasting with classical studies that mobilize analyses as VARCOMP, we deploy a multi-agent system simulating the behavior of firms adopting RBV or IO strategic mod…
Bayesian rating system for large competitions improves prediction and efficiency.
problem Rating systems for large, competitive events like online programming contests.
method Developed a Bayesian rating system for many participants, proving robustness and runtime.
result The system outperforms existing systems in accuracy and computation speed.
HMCNAS generates competitive neural architectures without human-defined parameters.
problem Lack of human-defined parameters in Neural Architecture Search.
method Combines Hidden Markov Chains and Bayesian Optimization for autonomous search space generation and competitive model generation.
result HMCNAS generates competitive models in a short time without human-defined parameters.
FLAIR measures LP competitiveness in AMMs, improving LP performance evaluations.
problem LP returns are affected by both market risk and competitive strategies.
method Introduces FLAIR metric to quantify LP competitiveness and assesses its impact on LP returns.
result FLAIR captures dynamic behavior of LPs and differentiates between active provisioning strategies.
The Affective Behavior Analysis in-the-wild (ABAW) 2020 Competition is the first Competition aiming at automatic analysis of the three main behavior tasks of valence-arousal estimation, basic expression recognition and action unit detection. It is split into three Challenges, each one addressing a respective behavior t…
In this study, we investigate the use of global information to speed up the learning process and increase the cumulative rewards of reinforcement learning (RL) in competition tasks. Within the actor-critic RL, we introduce multiple cooperative critics from two levels of the hierarchy and propose a reinforcement learnin…
Researchers improved Minecraft game performance using imitation learning.
problem Achieving state-of-the-art performance in immersive environments like Minecraft.
method Applied imitation learning to Minecraft, optimizing network architecture, loss function, and data augmentation.
result Reported stronger results than previous experiments, reaching second place in a competition.
Study examines machine learning competitions' impact on AI development.
problem Fostering innovation and skill development in AI.
method Analysis of major competition platforms, workflows, and participant demographics.
result MLCs promote collaboration, reproducibility, and continuous innovation in AI.
Challenge encourages reproducible deep learning methods.
problem Inconsistent training behavior in deep learning competitions.
method Evaluate methods based on their training procedures, retrain in controlled settings.
result Guaranteed reproducibility and generalization of methods.
Simplified image clustering achieves competitive results without text-based embeddings.
problem Complexity and resource requirements of state-of-the-art clustering methods.
method SCP: trains a small cluster head using pre-trained vision model features and positive data pairs.
result SCP achieves highly competitive performance on various benchmark datasets.
We study a portfolio optimization problem for competitive agents with CRRA utilities and a common finite time horizon. The utility of an agent depends not only on her absolute wealth and consumption but also on her relative wealth and consumption when compared to the averages among the other agents. We derive a closed …
New algorithm handles bandit problems under translations and scales.
problem Adversarial multi-armed bandit problems with arbitrary translations and scales.
method Innovative online algorithm invariant to translations and scales, using universal prediction.
result Second-order regret bounds, unaffected by affine transformations of losses.
Two-layer model studies reinsurance contracts and competition between insurer and reinsurers.
problem Modeling and analyzing reinsurance contracts and competition between insurer and reinsurers.
method Two-layer stochastic game model with insurer negotiating with reinsurers, and reinsurers competing for business.
result Existence and uniqueness of equilibrium strategies for the insurer and reinsurers, characterized in semiclosed form.
Deep network learns Obstacle Tower challenge without human demonstrations.
problem Master procedurally generated levels that get progressively harder.
method Deep Reinforcement Learning with a simple feed-forward network.
result Performed competitively in a reinforcement learning competition.
The paper analyzes performance criteria for competing fund managers in Ito-diffusion markets.
problem Analyzing performance of competing fund managers in Ito-diffusion markets.
method Developed forward relative performance criteria and forward Nash equilibrium for passive and competitive cases.
result Extended performance criteria for investment problems in Ito-diffusion markets.
Study shows market volatility affects optimal communication design for trading strategies.
problem Investigating how communication impacts trading strategy performance in multi-agent systems.
method 5-agent LLM-based trading systems across 450 experiments spanning 21 months, comparing 5 organizational structures.
result Communication improves performance but depends on market characteristics, with competitive conversation excelling in volatile tech stocks.
Study time-inconsistent portfolio optimization for competitive agents with relative performance criteria.
problem Time-inconsistent mean field and n-agent games under relative performance criteria.
method Construct open-loop equilibrium strategies for n-agent games and mean field games.
result Explicit solutions for n-agent games and mean field games, unique in a special class of equilibria.
Study examines financial performance determinants of Kenyan microfinance banks.
problem Competition from commercial banks threatens microfinance banks' financial performance.
method Descriptive research design with secondary data analysis.
result Operational efficiency, capital adequacy, and firm size positively correlate with financial performance.
This work tackles representation learning by introducing stochastic competition-based activations.
problem Learning diversified representations in deep learning models.
method Combining information-theoretic arguments with stochastic competition-based activations, using Stochastic Local Winner-Takes-All (LWTA) units.
result The proposed method yields significant discriminative representation learning abilities and allows for a principled investigation of intermediate network representations.
The paper improves competitive and dynamic regret bounds for smoothed online learning.
problem Smoothed online learning with hitting and switching costs.
method Optimization problems to minimize hitting cost, dynamic regret modification of existing algorithms.
result Improved competitive and dynamic regret bounds for various function classes.
Study many-player investment-consumption games with power FPPs, finding market-risk preference affects consumption.
problem Investment and consumption optimization in a mean field competition setting.
method Solve many-player and mean field games using power FPPs, providing closed-form solutions.
result Market-risk relative consumption preference affects agent's consumption decisions.
Study shows competition feedback can make ML predictors biased towards specific user groups.
problem How competition affects machine learning predictors and user prediction quality.
method Flexible model of competing ML predictors, empirical and mathematical analysis.
result Competition causes predictors to specialize for specific sub-populations at the cost of general performance.
A drone catches another agile drone using competitive reinforcement learning.
problem Intercepting an agile drone with another agile drone.
method Formulated as a Competitive Reinforcement Learning problem, trained with PPO, using a high-fidelity simulation environment.
result Trained policies outperform common heuristic baselines in catch rate, time to catch, and crash rate.
Machine learning is often used in competitive scenarios: Participants learn and fit static models, and those models compete in a shared platform. The common assumption is that in order to win a competition one has to have the best predictive model, i.e., the model with the smallest out-sample error. Is that necessarily…
US firms improve ESG performance in response to China trade shock.
problem Impact of China trade shock on US ESG performance.
method Trade policy experiment exploiting tariff changes.
result Greater import competition from China increases US firm ESG performance.
Study predicts individual treatment effects in ride-sharing competitions.
problem Understanding how team competitions affect individual drivers' outcomes.
method Analyzed data from 500 competitions, built machine learning models.
result Reduced out-sample prediction error by over 24%.
Paper tackles AI driving competition challenges with mixed simulation and real-world data.
problem AI algorithms perform poorly in real-world environments compared to simulated ones and vice versa.
method Employed imitation learning on a mixed dataset to train algorithms equally well in all environments.
result Trained algorithms performed well in both simulated and real-world environments.
Adaptive learning rate improves FTRL's performance in online learning.
problem Optimizing FTRL's learning rate for competitive regret in online learning.
method Formulated as a sequential decision-making problem, introduced competitive analysis framework, and proposed stability-penalty matching update rules.
result Achieved a constant competitive ratio under specific conditions, enabling Best-Of-Both-Worlds algorithms.
Kaggle chronicles 15 years of competitions, innovation, and data science.
problem Exploring 15 years of data science competitions and innovations.
method Longitudinal trend analysis and exploratory data analysis of millions of kernels and discussion threads.
result Kaggle is a growing platform with diverse use cases and adaptable Kagglers.
AdaSDBO solves decentralized bilevel optimization without problem parameters, achieving competitive performance.
problem Decentralized bilevel optimization problems without known parameters.
method AdaSDBO, a fully problem-parameter-free algorithm with adaptive stepsizes.
result AdaSDBO achieves a convergence rate of $\widetilde{\mathcal{O}}\left(\frac{1}{T}
ight)$, matching state-of-the-art methods up to polylogarithmic factors.
ContestTrade uses competitive teams to improve LLM trading performance.
problem High sensitivity to market noise in LLM-based trading systems.
method Internal competitive mechanism, data and research teams, real-time evaluation.
result Significantly outperforms other systems across various metrics.
New algorithm uses imperfect advice to improve online bipartite matching performance.
problem Online bipartite matching with imperfect advice.
method Designing an algorithm that uses external advice to improve performance between advice-free methods and optimal ratio.
result Algorithm achieves competitive ratio interpolating between advice-free methods and optimal ratio of 1.
The paper analyzes competition among fund managers using excess logarithmic returns and constructs games to find optimal allocations.
problem Optimal allocation strategies among fund managers considering excess logarithmic returns.
method Constructs both n-player and mean field games to address the competition problem. result The MFE of the MFG represents the limit of n-player game's equilibrium as n approaches infinity. Competition has been introduced in the electricity markets with the goal of reducing prices and improving efficiency. The basic idea which stays behind this choice is that, in competitive markets, a greater quantity of the good is exchanged at a lower and a lower price, leading to higher market efficiency. Electricity …
We analyze a family of portfolio management problems under relative performance criteria, for fund managers having CARA or CRRA utilities and trading in a common investment horizon in log-normal markets. We construct explicit constant equilibrium strategies for both the finite population games and the corresponding mea…
In this paper we study the problem of acoustic scene classification, i.e., categorization of audio sequences into mutually exclusive classes based on their spectral content. We describe the methods and results discovered during a competition organized in the context of a graduate machine learning course; both by the st…
Although a great methodological effort has been invested in proposing competitive solutions to the class-imbalance problem, little effort has been made in pursuing a theoretical understanding of this matter. In order to shed some light on this topic, we perform, through a novel framework, an exhaustive analysis of the …
Designing a single neural network architecture that performs competitively across a range of molecule property prediction tasks remains largely an open challenge, and its solution may unlock a widespread use of deep learning in the drug discovery industry. To move towards this goal, we propose Molecule Attention Transf…
This paper presents the first two editions of Visual Doom AI Competition, held in 2016 and 2017. The challenge was to create bots that compete in a multi-player deathmatch in a first-person shooter (FPS) game, Doom. The bots had to make their decisions based solely on visual information, i.e., a raw screen buffer. To p…
Algorithm provides online learning guarantees against general comparators in full and bandit feedback.
problem Adversarial online learning with data-dependent regret guarantees.
method Completely online algorithm with data-dependent regret guarantees for full and bandit feedback.
result Algorithm achieves expected performance against arbitrary comparator sequences in full and bandit feedback settings.
Pakistan examines digital mergers using traditional competition tools.
problem Regulating digital mergers in a developing country.
method Empirical comparative analysis of CCP's M&A decisions.
result CCP uses same decision factors for digital and traditional M&As.
Improving the performance of classifiers is the realm of feature mapping, prototype selection, and kernel function transformations; these techniques aim for reducing the complexity, and also, improving the accuracy of models. In particular, our objective is to combine them to transform data's shape into another more co…
When society maintains a competitive system to promote an abstract goal, competition by necessity relies on imperfect proxy measures. For instance profit is used to measure value to consumers, patient volumes to measure hospital performance, or the Journal Impact Factor to measure scientific value. Here we note that \t…
Adaptive volatility method improves probabilistic financial forecasting.
problem Probabilistic forecasting in financial markets.
method Adapts classical time-varying volatility models with online stochastic optimization.
result Ranked 5th in M6 financial forecasting competition.
The learning of hierarchical representations for image classification has experienced an impressive series of successes due in part to the availability of large-scale labeled data for training. On the other hand, the trained classifiers have traditionally been evaluated on small and fixed sets of test images, which are…