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Research

Cover of Nathaniel Coulter's ItôFormer Published Research Paper
01

ItôFormer: Augmenting Stochastic Validity in Financial-centric Deep Neural Networks

DOI: dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.6742840

Cover of Nathaniel Coulter's Tokenization and Transformer Architectures Published Research Paper
02

Tokenization and Transformer Architectures for Cross-Asset Allocation: Controlled Ablation in Financial Time Series

DOI: dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.6934938

Cover of Nathaniel Coulter's Neural Portfolio Allocators Published Research Paper
03

Neural Portfolio Allocators: Cross-Asset Optimization Strategies with Attention-Based Transformers and Multi-Agents

DOI: dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.5447734

Cover of Nathaniel Coulter's Modeling Nonlinear Pharmacokinetics Published Research Paper
04

Modeling Nonlinear Pharmacokinetics: Clinical v. Anecdotal Data (LGD-4033) Why Dosage Is Not the Same as Exposure!

DOI: dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.6934521

Cover of Nathaniel Coulter's Quantamental Portfolio Allocators Published Research Paper
05

Quantamental Portfolio Allocators: Deriving Alpha from Fundamental Metrics with ML

DOI: doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.6934778

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Research / Publication SSRN / ONLINE JOURNAL
View at SSRN Elsevier

Neural Portfolio Allocators: Cross-Asset Optimization Strategies with Attention-Based Transformers and Multi-Agents

Abstract

Classical portfolio optimization frameworks, such as Markowitz's mean-variance model and risk parity, rely on linear, stationary assumptions that rarely hold in real financial markets. Asset returns exhibit regime shifts, nonlinear dependencies, and evolving correlation structures, causing classical models to misestimate risk and overstate diversification benefits. While recurrent neural networks (RNNs) and long short-term memory networks (LSTMs) have improved the modeling of local temporal dependencies, they remain limited in capturing long range, cross-asset interactions critical to portfolio allocation.

This study proposes an attention-based Transformer architecture for direct portfolio weight allocation, jointly learning temporal dependencies and cross-asset relationships without the fixed memory horizon of RNN-based models. To further enhance performance and adaptability, we integrate: (i) reinforcement learning with Tsallis entropy regularization to encourage diversification while retaining the ability to concentrate when conviction is high, (ii) multi-agent Transformer heads specializing in distinct optimization objectives (risk minimization, return maximization, volatility targeting), and (iii) NEAT (NeuroEvolution of Augmenting Topologies) evolutionary hyperparameter search to automatically adapt and optimize architectural parameters to the asset universe. Complementary experiments incorporate MGARCH volatility models, Geometric Brownian Motion, and Monte Carlo simulations providing stochastic stress tests and robustness checks beyond standard academic benchmarks, highlighting practical applicability.

The proposed architecture is evaluated against classical optimization baselines and LSTM-based allocators across equities, fixed income, commodities, volatility indices, options, and credit spreads. Performance is assessed in terms of risk-adjusted returns, robustness to regime shifts and tail risk, including interpretability via attention-weight visualizations. Our overarching hypothesis is that attention-based sequence models, augmented with diversication-aware reinforcement learning and evolutionary search, can produce more efficient and resilient portfolios than both classical and recurrent approaches.

Complementary Paper: Coulter, N. (2025). Tokenization and Transformer Architectures for Cross-Asset Allocation: Controlled Ablation in Financial Time Series (1.0). SSRN. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.17168828

Keywords

Attention-based Transformers, Multi-Agent Portfolio Optimization, Reinforcement Learning with Tsallis Entropy, Neuroevolution (NEAT) Hyperparameter Search, Nonstationarity in Financial Markets, Entropy-Regularized Allocators, Tail Risk Hedging, Ergodicity and Non-Markovian Dynamics

JEL Classification

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Suggested Citation

Coulter, Nathaniel, Neural Portfolio Allocators: Cross-Asset Optimization Strategies with Attention-Based Transformers and Multi-Agents (September 05, 2025). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=5447734 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.5447734

Repository

github.com/Nathaniel-Coulter

Declaration of Interest

The author declares no competing financial interests, commercial affiliations, or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

Ethics Approval

This study did not involve human subjects research, clinical interventions, patient recruitment, or access to protected health information. All clinical data were obtained from publicly available published literature, and anecdotal observations were derived from publicly available self-reported sources that were anonymized and analyzed in aggregate for educational and research purposes. Accordingly, institutional review board (IRB) approval was not required.

Funder Statement

This research received no external funding and was conducted independently by the author.

License Information

SSRN

The copyright holder has granted SSRN a license. All rights reserved. No reuse allowed without permission.

GitHub

MIT License

Copyright (c) 2025 Nathaniel Coulter

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The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.