Starting a 30 day ML stock prediction challenge using AMZN

I’m starting a 30 day challenge where I’ll post one daily prediction from a machine learning model and track the results publicly. The prediction is simple: will tomorrow’s close price be higher or lower than today’s close price? For Day 1, I’m using AMZN with a LightGBM classification model. The setup is: Model: LightGBM with custom hyperparameters Stock: Amazon, daily data Start date: Jan 1, 2020 Features: SMA 10, 100, 200 and EMA 10, 100, 200 Preprocessing: MinMax normalization Validation setup: 90 day in sample, 30 day out of sample testing Target: next day close higher or lower than today’s close I fine tuned the model until the backtest looked reasonable, but I’m not claiming this is a proven strategy or financial advice. The goal is to see how well this holds up live over 30 trading days, without hindsight. The current backtest shows the AI model outperforming buy and hold on AMZN, with higher cumulative return and lower max drawdown. That said, the out of sample classification metrics are still modest, so I’m treating this as an experiment. **Day 1 Prediction:** The model is predicting that Amazon’s next trading day close price on **May 26** will be **lower** than the last close price of **$266.32**. Model confidence: **54%** I’ll track this with a **$1,000 starting balance** and report back the next trading day with the updated balance, the result of the prediction, and the next recommendation. DM me if you’re interested in chatting about specifics. [Equity curve](https://preview.redd.it/sm6mbmgnbc3h1.png?width=2048&format=png&auto=webp&s=e86e9e27cd4151b44e790e1a7c148280c857bfee) [Average return vs. historical model confidence](https://preview.redd.it/jjx8fh2rbc3h1.png?width=2048&format=png&auto=webp&s=ed8c03a94726d087e3b365be876a7622719a4648) [Buy and hold vs. model backtest results](https://preview.redd.it/906pf5fsbc3h1.png?width=2048&format=png&auto=webp&s=756ebec475bef71605016dbbc14ed4fbb731c227)