Stock Price Forecasting: An Echo State Network Approach

Forecasting stock prices using deep learning models suffers from pro-blems such as low accuracy,slow convergence,and complex network structures.This study developed an echo state network(ESN)model to mitigate such pro-blems.We compared our ESN with a long short-term memory(LSTM)network by forecasting the stock data of Kweichow Moutai,a leading enterprise in China’s liquor industry.By analyzing data for 120,240,and 300 days,we generated fore-cast data for the next 40,80,and 100 days,respectively,using both ESN and LSTM.In terms of accuracy,ESN had the unique advantage of capturing non-linear data.Mean absolute error(MAE)was used to present the accuracy results.The MAEs of the data forecast by ESN were 0.024,0.024,and 0.025,which were,respectively,0.065,0.007,and 0.009 less than those of LSTM.In terms of con-vergence,ESN has a reservoir state-space structure,which makes it perform faster than other models.Root-mean-square error(RMSE)was used to present the con-vergence time.In our experiment,the RMSEs of ESN were 0.22,0.27,and 0.26,which were,respectively,0.08,0.01,and 0.12 less than those of LSTM.In terms of network structure,ESN consists only of input,reservoir,and output spaces,making it a much simpler model than the others.The proposed ESN was found to be an effective model that,compared to others,converges faster,forecasts more accurately,and builds time-series analyses more easily.