Document Type

Article

Peer Reviewed

1

Publication Date

4-1-2013

Scholarship Domain(s)

Scholarship of Discovery

Abstract

Predator prey models have been used for years to model animal populations. In recent years they have begun to be applied to economic situations. However, the stock market has remained largely untouched. We examine whether the success of competitive corporations such as Target and Walmart, as measured by the indicators of price per share, market share, and volume, can be modeled by various predator prey models. We consider the basic Lotka-Volterra model and the two-predator, one-prey model, as well as a ratio-dependent model. We discuss the use of numerical techniques and regression analysis as tools to estimate model parameters. For Target and Walmart, the predator prey models mentioned above do not accurately fit the stock market data. In order to more fully explore the use of predator prey models in the stock market, we have examined several other competing companies using a simple Lotka-Volterra model, and found that critical model parameters were not statistically significant. While not statistically significant, these results help reinforce the unpredictability and complexity of markets and provide insight for future research.

Comments

Honors Capstone Project completed in 2013 for Olivet Nazarene University.

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