# Transfer Learning for Portfolio Optimization

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2307.13546 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2307.13546/

## Key facts

- Cited by 1 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Builds on 17 of its 43 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 25 Jul 2023.

## Builds on (most cited first, 17 of 17)

- [BERT: Pre-training of Deep Bidirectional Transformers for Language Understanding](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1810.04805/) (2018)
- [Training language models to follow instructions with human feedback](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2203.02155/) (2022)
- [Domain-Adversarial Training of Neural Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1505.07818/) (2015)
- [Unsupervised Domain Adaptation by Backpropagation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1409.7495/) (2014)
- [Learning Transferable Features with Deep Adaptation Networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1502.02791/) (2015)
- [Adversarial Discriminative Domain Adaptation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1702.05464/) (2017)
- [A Comprehensive Survey on Transfer Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1911.02685/) (2019)
- [Deep Visual Domain Adaptation: A Survey](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1802.03601/) (2018)
- [Optimal Transport for Domain Adaptation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1507.00504/) (2015)
- [A Survey on Deep Transfer Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1808.01974/) (2018)
- [VL-Adapter: Parameter-Efficient Transfer Learning for Vision-and-Language Tasks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2112.06825/) (2021)
- [An Information-Theoretic Approach to Transferability in Task Transfer Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2212.10082/) (2022)
- [OTCE: A Transferability Metric for Cross-Domain Cross-Task Representations](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2103.13843/) (2021)
- [Stratified Transfer Learning for Cross-domain Activity Recognition](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1801.00820/) (2017)
- [Learning a functional control for high-frequency finance](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2006.09611/) (2020)
- [Transfer Learning for Retinal Vascular Disease Detection: A Pilot Study with Diabetic Retinopathy and Retinopathy of Prematurity](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2201.01250/) (2022)
- [Feasibility and Transferability of Transfer Learning: A Mathematical Framework](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2301.11542/) (2023)

## Built on by (most cited first, 1 of 1)

- [Adaptive Multi-task Learning for Multi-sector Portfolio Optimization](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2507.16433/) (2025)

## Abstract (arXiv)

In this work, we explore the possibility of utilizing transfer learning techniques to address the financial portfolio optimization problem. We introduce a novel concept called "transfer risk", within the optimization framework of transfer learning. A series of numerical experiments are conducted from three categories: cross-continent transfer, cross-sector transfer, and cross-frequency transfer. In particular, 1. a strong correlation between the transfer risk and the overall performance of transfer learning methods is established, underscoring the significance of transfer risk as a viable indicator of "transferability"; 2. transfer risk is shown to provide a computationally efficient way to identify appropriate source tasks in transfer learning, enhancing the efficiency and effectiveness of the transfer learning approach; 3. additionally, the numerical experiments offer valuable new insights for portfolio management across these different settings.