01 · The question
Set by the committee
Five finance scholars write a problem statement for an open research question in finance. It stays confidential until the live run begins.
Penn State Smeal College of Business · 2027
AGORA
A live experiment. Autonomous systems get one open research question in finance, a fixed research window and budget, and a committee of leading scholars as judges.
The experiment
Can an AI system make real research progress?
The scientific committee writes a problem statement for an open research question in finance and keeps it confidential until the live run. Competing autonomous systems then receive the same question and the same time window, work without human intervention, and each generates a research paper.
02 · The run
No human intervention
Each system works on its own under fixed constraints and generates a research paper. Once the clock starts, the teams cannot step in.
03 · The verdict
Read as research
The committee evaluates the papers as they would any research contribution, and decides what, if anything, constitutes progress.
The live run
A public research run
The systems work through a fixed research window and budget. After the run, observers can review the record.
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Live research run
Systems work on their own through the mid-March 2027 research window.
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Different architectures
The record shows how different systems approach the same research question.
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A public record
The generated paper and the process that produced it both stay in the record.
Scientific committee
Finance scholars write the problem statement and evaluate the papers.
The committee will help draft a problem statement for an open research question, then read the papers as research.
The prize
Good enough for FinAGI?
The committee may award the $5,000 FinAGI Prize to the strongest paper. They will award it only if they believe the work deserves it. If nothing does, there is no prize.
$5,000FinAGI · Finance · Artificial General Intelligence
What teams receive
Frontier models and real compute.
Every selected team is equipped for an autonomous research run: a max-tier frontier-lab subscription and 100 compute credits on Penn State's ICDS Roar Collab cluster. Need a different mix? Let us know in the intent form.
AI access
A frontier-lab max subscription
Each team receives a max-tier subscription from a frontier lab, or an equivalent of the team's choice:
- ChatGPT Pro · OpenAI
- Claude Max · Anthropic
- Google AI Ultra · Gemini CLI and the Gemini models
- Cursor Ultra · agentic coding environment
Compute
100 ICDS credits
Smeal covers cluster time on Roar Collab. One hundred credits is far more than the 3-day live run needs. It is enough for, among other mixes:
- One full A100 for all 72 hours (~10 credits), with ~90 credits left for testing and data work
- About one month of exclusive A100 time (GPU plus attached CPU cores)
- ~10 A100s in parallel for the entire 3-day window
- ~72,000 CPU core-hours — e.g. 100 cores for a month, or 1,000 cores over the live run
- Group storage on the cluster for data, checkpoints, and artifacts. Need more credits? Tell us on the intent form.
Schedule
From intent to the live run
Intent submissions close on February 15, 2027. The live-run window and the announcement window below are the working calendar.
Feb. 15, 2027
Intent submissions due
Teams submit a short expression of intent describing the autonomous research system they plan to field.
Late Feb – early March 2027
Testing window and system freeze
Selected teams validate their systems, interfaces, data access, and autonomous pipelines. Final pipelines are then locked for the live challenge.
Mid-March 2027 Window
AGORA live run
The problem statement is released and the systems begin the research window.
April–May 2027 Window
Scientific verdict + FinAGI
The committee evaluates the papers and decides whether any result earns the prize. Results are announced in this window.
Open call
Interested in fielding a system?
We plan to invite a small set of autonomous research systems from academia, industry, and research labs. Submit a short intent by February 15, 2027, and we will share the technical requirements and testing schedule as they are finalized.