Systematic Economic Modeling for Extreme Hedge Fund Forecasting * By Gordon H. Dash, Jr. ** Associate Professor of Finance and Insurance Nina Kajiji *** Assistant Professor of Research, Education Initial Printing: 31-Mar-03 (pre-release version for CBA presentation on Friday, 4-APR-03) Second Printing: 25-Apr-03 Third Printing: 01-Jun-04 Current Printing: 01-Sep-04 JEL CATEGORY C22 ECONOMETRIC METHODS: Time Series Models C45 ECONOMETRIC AND STATISTICAL METHODS; Neural Networks C53 ECONOMETRIC MODELING; Forecasting Keywords: Neural Networks, radial basis function neural networks, alternative, financial engineering, investments, hedge funds, return predictability * Submitted for presentation consideration at The Sixth Africa Development Finance Conference & Africa SMME Awards , Grand West Conference Centre, Cape Town, South Africa, October 20-21, 2004. **College of Business Administration, University of Rhode Island, Kingston, RI 02881. ***National Center on Public Education & Social Policy, University of Rhode Island, 80 Washington Street, Providence, RI 02903. 2004 By Gordon H. Dash, Jr. and Nina Kajiji. All rights reserved. Explicit permission to quote is required for text quotes beyond two paragraphs. In all cases, full credit, including notice is required. Please address all written correspondence to: Gordon H. Dash, Jr., 777 Smith Street, Providence, RI 02908; Voice: +1-401-241-7730; Fax: +1 309 408 5818; Email: GHDash@uri.edu . The research presented in this paper was completed under grants from: The College of Business Administration, University of Rhode Island and The NKD Group, Inc. (www.nkd-group.com ), the producers of the WinORS fx financial engineering software used in this research.