HDSC August ’21 Capstone Project Presentation: Stock Price Prediction

A Project by Team Xgboost

The Hamoye HDSC-21 cohort started on the first of August 2021. The training was divided into 5 stages with 2 projects, the premier and capstone projects. Each stage spanned 2weeks. Before the official commencement of the program, there were a few prerequisite courses available, especially for beginners, which could also be a refresher for intermediate to advanced learners. The program was scheduled for 3 and half months. There were 3 tracks: Data storytelling, Data science, and Data engineering.

We were divided into project groups and the Xgboost group was tasked with the analysis of stock prices of Google, Oracle, Amazon, Microsoft, to visualize how stock prices have risen in the last 5 years. Data for the stock prices was obtained from Kaggle. This project was chosen to minimize the risk associated with investing.

What actions were taken with the dataset?

Data Processing and EDA: We used python to perform the data analysis. The basic attributes of the stock were analysed using python libraries like pandas, matplotlib, and numpy. Other activities done on the dataset include determining the independent variables and dependent variables; identifying and handling missing values; encoding the company names;

Feature Engineering: We performed some feature engineering to standardize the independent variables of a dataset within a specific range so as to limit the range of variables and compare them on common grounds.

The Result: Analysis of the stock prices show that in the long term, most stock prices will increase. Though the short term might fluctuate.