1. A method for compressing at least one floating point number, comprising the steps of: obtaining said at least one floating point number represented using one or more bits to indicate a sign of said at least one floating point number and one or more additional bits to indicate an exponent at a given base and a significand of said at least one floating point number, wherein said significand has a length equal to a number of bits between a most significant bit of said significand and a least significant bit of said significand having a predefined binary value; applying, using at least one processing device, a plurality of distinct prediction algorithms to said at least one floating point number to generate a corresponding plurality of predictions; selecting, using the at least one processing device, a given one of said plurality of distinct prediction algorithms for said at least one floating point number by evaluating a compression metric applied to said plurality of predictions; and encoding, using the at least one processing device, said at least one floating point number by encoding said exponent and said length as a single code using a residual generated by said selected prediction algorithm.