# AlphaPilot: Multi-Turn Tool-Using LLM Agents for Adaptive Alpha Mining with Reinforcement Learning

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2610.15488 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2610.15488/

## Key facts

- No citing papers in the map yet (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Placed in Financial trading and forecasting agents, one of 16 directions in LLM agents and tool use.
- Builds on 19 of its 36 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 11 Oct 2026.

## 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, 19 of 19)

- [HybridFlow: A Flexible and Efficient RLHF Framework](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2409.19256/) (2024)
- [Search-R1: Training LLMs to Reason and Leverage Search Engines with Reinforcement Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.09516/) (2025)
- [BloombergGPT: A Large Language Model for Finance](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2303.17564/) (2023)
- [Deep symbolic regression: Recovering mathematical expressions from data via risk-seeking policy gradients](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1912.04871/) (2019)
- [AlphaAgent: LLM-Driven Alpha Mining with Regularized Exploration to Counteract Alpha Decay](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2502.16789/) (2025)
- [Automate Strategy Finding with LLM in Quant Investment](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2409.06289/) (2024)
- [Navigating the Alpha Jungle: An LLM-Powered MCTS Framework for Formulaic Factor Mining](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.11122/) (2025)
- [Cognitive Alpha Mining via LLM-Driven Code-Based Evolution](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2511.18850/) (2025)
- [AlphaEval: A Comprehensive and Efficient Evaluation Framework for Formula Alpha Mining](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2508.13174/) (2025)
- [FinToolBench: Evaluating LLM Agents for Real-World Financial Tool Use](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2603.08262/) (2026)
- [GPT-Signal: Generative AI for Semi-automated Feature Engineering in the Alpha Research Process](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2410.18448/) (2024)
- [FinMCP-Bench: Benchmarking LLM Agents for Real-World Financial Tool Use under the Model Context Protocol](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2603.24943/) (2026)
- [Alpha-R1: Alpha Screening with LLM Reasoning via Reinforcement Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2512.23515/) (2025)
- [FinVault: Benchmarking Financial Agent Safety in Execution-Grounded Environments](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2601.07853/) (2026)
- [Learning from Expert Factors: Trajectory-level Reward Shaping for Formulaic Alpha Mining](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2507.20263/) (2025)
- [AlphaLogics: A Market Logic-Driven Multi-Agent System for Scalable and Interpretable Alpha Factor Generation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2603.20247/) (2026)
- [Alpha Mining and Enhancing via Warm Start Genetic Programming for Quantitative Investment](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2412.00896/) (2024)
- [AlphaPROBE: Alpha Mining via Principled Retrieval and On-graph biased evolution](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2602.11917/) (2026)
- [Trade-R1: Bridging Verifiable Rewards to Stochastic Environments via Process-Level Reasoning Verification](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2601.03948/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Formulaic alpha mining seeks interpretable expressions that rank assets by future returns. The task is challenging because it demands simultaneous processing of unstructured market descriptions, historical data, and quantitative evaluation of candidate factors, yet most existing methods exploit only a subset of these signals. We introduce AlphaPilot, a reinforcement-learning framework that trains multi-turn tool-using LLM agents for adaptive alpha mining. The agent conditions on market descriptions, proposes factor expressions, queries real-data evaluator feedback, and updates a retained factor pool across turns. This design jointly leverages market text, LLM financial knowledge, real data, and evaluation feedback. At inference time, AlphaPilot performs day-by-day search and pool updates to adapt to shifting market regimes. Across three independent runs in out-of-sample rolling backtests on CSI300 and CSI500, AlphaPilot achieves mean total returns of 42.93% and 54.19%, with mean Sharpe ratios of 2.46 and 2.86, respectively. It attains the highest mean total return, Sharpe, and RankIC among the evaluated methods on both universes.