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Markov decision processes are useful models of concurrency optimisation problems, but are often intractable for exhaustive verification methods. Recent work has introduced lightweight approximative techniques that sample directly from…

Logic in Computer Science · Computer Science 2015-03-24 Axel Legay , Sean Sedwards , Louis-Marie Traonouez

Many recent successful (deep) reinforcement learning algorithms make use of regularization, generally based on entropy or Kullback-Leibler divergence. We propose a general theory of regularized Markov Decision Processes that generalizes…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2019-06-05 Matthieu Geist , Bruno Scherrer , Olivier Pietquin

We study the optimization of the expected long-term reward in finite partially observable Markov decision processes over the set of stationary stochastic policies. In the case of deterministic observations, also known as state aggregation,…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2022-11-18 Mareike Dressler , Marina Garrote-López , Guido Montúfar , Johannes Müller , Kemal Rose

The paper studies a system of first order Hamilton-Jacobi equations with discontinuous coefficients, arising from a model of deterministic optimal debt management in infinite time horizon, with exponential discount and currency devaluation.…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2021-02-09 Antonio Marigonda , Khai T. Nguyen

We present the convergence rates of synchronous and asynchronous Q-learning for average-reward Markov decision processes, where the absence of contraction poses a fundamental challenge. Existing non-asymptotic results overcome this…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2026-01-30 Zijun Chen , Zaiwei Chen , Nian Si , Shengbo Wang

The linear Markov Decision Process (MDP) framework offers a principled foundation for reinforcement learning (RL) with strong theoretical guarantees and sample efficiency. However, its restrictive assumption-that both transition dynamics…

Machine Learning · Statistics 2025-06-03 Sinian Zhang , Kaicheng Zhang , Ziping Xu , Tianxi Cai , Doudou Zhou

We consider an optimal investment and consumption problem for a Black-Scholes financial market with stochastic coefficients driven by a diffusion process. We assume that an agent makes consumption and investment decisions based on CRRA…

Portfolio Management · Quantitative Finance 2011-12-12 Berdjane Belkacem , Serguei Pergamenchtchikov

We present a new geometric interpretation of Markov Decision Processes (MDPs) with a natural normalization procedure that allows us to adjust the value function at each state without altering the advantage of any action with respect to any…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2025-03-06 Arsenii Mustafin , Aleksei Pakharev , Alex Olshevsky , Ioannis Ch. Paschalidis

This paper studies optimal liquidity provision for perpetual contracts when the funding rate is a stochastic state variable. The core extension to classical market making is the coupling between inventory and funding payments: inventory…

Mathematical Finance · Quantitative Finance 2026-05-08 Nam Anh Le

We consider a discrete-time Markov decision process with Borel state and action spaces. The performance criterion is to maximize a total expected {utility determined by unbounded return function. It is shown the existence of optimal…

Probability · Mathematics 2018-10-08 François Dufour , Alexandre Genadot

We derive a framework to compute optimal controls for problems with states in the space of probability measures. Since many optimal control problems constrained by a system of ordinary differential equations (ODE) modelling interacting…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2020-09-23 Martin Burger , René Pinnau , Claudia Totzeck , Oliver Tse

The analysis of Temporal Difference (TD) learning in the average-reward setting faces notable theoretical difficulties because the Bellman operator is not contractive with respect to any norm. This complicates standard analyses of…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2026-05-05 Haoxing Tian , Zaiwei Chen , Ioannis Ch. Paschalidis , Alex Olshevsky

We propose a principled kernel-based policy iteration algorithm to solve the continuous-state Markov Decision Processes (MDPs). In contrast to most decision-theoretic planning frameworks, which assume fully known state transition models, we…

Robotics · Computer Science 2020-06-04 Junhong Xu , Kai Yin , Lantao Liu

Recently, Sidford, Wang, Wu and Ye (2018) developed an algorithm combining variance reduction techniques with value iteration to solve discounted Markov decision processes. This algorithm has a sublinear complexity when the discount factor…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2019-09-16 Marianne Akian , Stéphane Gaubert , Zheng Qu , Omar Saadi

The Markov decision process is the mathematical formalization underlying the modern field of reinforcement learning when transition and reward functions are unknown. We derive a pseudo-Boolean cost function that is equivalent to a K-spin…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2020-04-14 Eric B. Jones , Peter Graf , Eliot Kapit , Wesley Jones

In a Markovian framework, we consider the problem of finding the minimal initial value of a controlled process allowing to reach a stochastic target with a given level of expected loss. This question arises typically in approximate hedging…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2017-04-06 Géraldine Bouveret , Jean-François Chassagneux

Planning problems where effects of actions are non-deterministic can be modeled as Markov decision processes. Planning problems are usually goal-directed. This paper proposes several techniques for exploiting the goal-directedness to…

Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science 2013-02-08 Nevin Lianwen Zhang , Weihong Zhang

Consider the problem of predicting the next symbol given a sample path of length n, whose joint distribution belongs to a distribution class that may have long-term memory. The goal is to compete with the conditional predictor that knows…

Statistics Theory · Mathematics 2024-04-25 Yanjun Han , Tianze Jiang , Yihong Wu

This paper develops a new deep learning algorithm to solve a class of finite-horizon mean-field games. The proposed hybrid algorithm uses Markov chain approximation method combined with a stochastic approximation-based iterative deep…

Optimization and Control · Mathematics 2024-12-12 Yu Zhang , Zhuo Jin , Jiaqin Wei , George Yin

We propose a new approach to solving dynamic decision problems with rewards that are unbounded below. The approach involves transforming the Bellman equation in order to convert an unbounded problem into a bounded one. The major advantage…

Theoretical Economics · Economics 2019-12-02 Qingyin Ma , John Stachurski