Optimal Estimating Equations for Compact-Memory Hawkes Processes

Abstract

Likelihood is standard for Hawkes-process inference, while less computationally demanding methods have largely developed separately. We show that least squares, Takács--Fiksel, and related moment-based estimators form a single class of compensator-based estimating equations, with the likelihood score as the efficient benchmark. For fixed-dimensional multivariate Hawkes processes with compact memory, nonlinear positive links, and signed kernels allowing inhibition, every suitably regular predictable functional of a fixed lag window yields an unbiased estimating equation when integrated against $\text{d} N-λ\,\text{d} t$. Under common regularity, identification, and rank conditions, estimators based on every admissible finite library achieve uniform high-probability and pointwise almost-sure $\mathcal O(\sqrt{\log(T)/T})$ rates, asymptotic normality with Godambe covariance, and admit feasible two-step optimal weighting. A projection identity quantifies each library's exact efficiency loss as the score information outside its predictable span; a two-point bound shows the root-$T$ scale cannot be improved uniformly. Although compact memory localizes the intensity rather than the stationary law, exponential forgetting yields Bernstein-type concentration and transfers the theory to nonstationary starts after a logarithmic burn-in. Within this scope, the compensator class is exhaustive for finite-library comparisons: it contains the score, gives admissible libraries common guarantees, and quantifies their efficiency gaps exactly.