# ContestTrade: A Multi-Agent Trading System Based on Internal Contest Mechanism

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2508.00554 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2508.00554/

## Key facts

- Cited by 8 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Placed in Financial trading and forecasting agents, one of 16 directions in LLM agents and tool use.
- Builds on 21 of its 35 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 1 Aug 2025.

## Placed in

- LLM agents and tool use / [Financial trading and forecasting agents](https://mlsanity.com/agents/financial-trading-and-forecasting-agents/)

## Builds on (most cited first, 21 of 21)

- [ReAct: Synergizing Reasoning and Acting in Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2210.03629/) (2022)
- [Toolformer: Language Models Can Teach Themselves to Use Tools](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2302.04761/) (2023)
- [Lost in the Middle: How Language Models Use Long Contexts](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2307.03172/) (2023)
- [BloombergGPT: A Large Language Model for Finance](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2303.17564/) (2023)
- [FinGPT: Open-Source Financial Large Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2306.06031/) (2023)
- [TradingAgents: Multi-Agents LLM Financial Trading Framework](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2412.20138/) (2024)
- [FinMem: A Performance-Enhanced LLM Trading Agent with Layered Memory and Character Design](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2311.13743/) (2023)
- [A Multimodal Foundation Agent for Financial Trading: Tool-Augmented, Diversified, and Generalist](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2402.18485/) (2024)
- [Can ChatGPT Forecast Stock Price Movements? Return Predictability and Large Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2304.07619/) (2023)
- [NoLiMa: Long-Context Evaluation Beyond Literal Matching](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2502.05167/) (2025)
- [FinCon: A Synthesized LLM Multi-Agent System with Conceptual Verbal Reinforcement for Enhanced Financial Decision Making](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2407.06567/) (2024)
- [Large Language Model Agent in Financial Trading: A Survey](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2408.06361/) (2024)
- [Alpha-GPT: Human-AI Interactive Alpha Mining for Quantitative Investment](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2308.00016/) (2023)
- [FinRobot: An Open-Source AI Agent Platform for Financial Applications using Large Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2405.14767/) (2024)
- [Learning to Generate Explainable Stock Predictions using Self-Reflective Large Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2402.03659/) (2024)
- [LLMFactor: Extracting Profitable Factors through Prompts for Explainable Stock Movement Prediction](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2406.10811/) (2024)
- [QuantAgent: Seeking Holy Grail in Trading by Self-Improving Large Language Model](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2402.03755/) (2024)
- [Can Large Language Models Beat Wall Street? Unveiling the Potential of AI in Stock Selection](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2401.03737/) (2024)
- [Unveiling the Potential of Sentiment: Can Large Language Models Predict Chinese Stock Price Movements?](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2306.14222/) (2023)
- [Alpha-GPT 2.0: Human-in-the-Loop AI for Quantitative Investment](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2402.09746/) (2024)
- [MASS: Muli-agent simulation scaling for portfolio construction](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.10278/) (2025)

## Built on by (most cited first, 8 of 8)

- [LiveTradeBench: Seeking Real-World Alpha with Large Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2511.03628/) (2025)
- [Agentic Trading: When LLM Agents Meet Financial Markets](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2605.19337/) (2026)
- [Market-Dependent Communication in Multi-Agent Alpha Generation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2511.13614/) (2025)
- [Orchestration Framework for Financial Agents: From Algorithmic Trading to Agentic Trading](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2512.02227/) (2025)
- [Beyond Agent Architecture: Execution Assumptions and Reproducibility in LLM-Based Trading Systems](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2606.08285/) (2026)
- [AlgoEvolve: LLM-driven Meta-evolution of Algorithmic Trading Programs](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2606.26173/) (2026)
- [SoK: Trading Agents or Market Crashers? Dissecting Robustness and Security Failures in Academic Financial LLM Trading Schemes](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2609.19705/) (2026)
- [Contagion on the Trading Floor: How Adversarial Signals Spread in Multi-Agent Trading Systems](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2609.19789/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

In financial trading, large language model (LLM)-based agents demonstrate significant potential, but their decisions can be sensitive to noisy and non-stationary market information. We propose ContestTrade, a multi-agent trading system with an internal competitive mechanism inspired by institutional investment workflows. The system consists of two specialized teams: (1) a Data Team that processes and condenses massive market data into diversified textual factors optimized for constrained LLM context windows, and (2) a Research Team that produces parallelized multipath trading decisions via tool-augmented deep research. The core design is a "Quantify-Predict-Allocate" contest mechanism within each team: agent outputs are scored only after market outcomes become observable, future utility is predicted from historical scores, and resources are allocated to agents with positive predicted utility. In a post-2024 A-share backtest, ContestTrade achieves higher backtested return and risk-adjusted performance than the evaluated baselines. We further describe the temporal protocol, implementation choices, and limitations to clarify the scope of these results.