Stephen A. Ross is the Franco Modigliani Professor of Finance and Economics at the Sloan School of Management, Massachusetts Institute of Technology. One of the most widely published authors in finance and economics, Professor Ross is recognised for his work in developing Arbitrage Pricing Theory and his substantial contributions to the discipline through his research in signalling, agency theory, option pricing and the theory of the term structure of interest rates, among other topics. A past president of the American Finance Association, he currently serves as an associate editor of several academic and practitioner journals. He is a trustee of CalTech and a director of the College Retirement Equity Fund (CREF) and Freddie Mac, an organisation devoted to expanding opportunities for home ownership and affordable rental housing.

Spencer Thompson was formerly Professor of Finance, Head of the School of Finance and Head of the Department of Accounting and Law at the Queensland University of Technology. He has extensive teaching experience, having taught finance at degree, masters and doctorate levels for more than 20 years. Prior to his teaching, he worked in industry as managing director of a group of service companies controlling the day-to-day finance activities for a diverse set of business organisations. He obtained his undergraduate degree from the University of Queensland with first class honours, the Thomas Brown Prize and the University Medal. His doctoral research looked at the changing characteristics of corporate risk.

Mark Christensen has a longstanding interest in both applied and theoretical issues in corporate finance. He has had extensive experience teaching all levels of corporate finance at the Queensland University of Technology and for numerous national and international institutes and professional bodies. He has a practical and interactive approach to learning and he helps understanding by developing concepts in a logical and easy-to-follow manner. This approach flows through to the text. Mark regularly consults in both the private and government sectors in the areas of discounted cash flow analysis, financial management, WACC and beta estimation. His applied research interests also extend to corporate valuation and risk management. He has a keen interest in finance education and regularly speaks to the broader community to further public understanding of corporate finance.

Randolph W. Westerfield is Dean Emeritus of the University of Southern California’s Marshall School of Business and is the Charles B. Thornton Professor of Finance. He came to USC from the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, where he was the chairman of the finance department and a member of the finance faculty for 20 years. He is a member of several public company boards of directors including Health Management Associates, Inc., and the Nicholas Applegate growth fund. His areas of expertise include corporate financial policy, investment management and stock market price behaviour.

Bradford D. Jordan is Professor of Finance and holder of the Richard W. and Janis H. Furst Endowed Chair in Finance at the University of Kentucky. He has a long-standing interest in both applied and theoretical issues in corporate finance and has extensive experience teaching all levels of corporate finance and financial management policy. Professor Jordan has published numerous articles on issues such as cost of capital, capital structure and the behaviour of security prices. He is a past president of the Southern Finance Association and he is the co-author of Fundamentals of Investments: Valuation and Management, 4e, a leading investments text, also published by McGraw-Hill/Irwin.