The decade since the publication of the Cadbury Report in1992 has seen growing interest in corporate governance. This growth has recently become an explosion with major corporate scandals such as WorldCom and Enron in the US, the international diffusion of corporate governance codes and wider interest in researching corporate governance in different institutional contexts and through different subject lenses.

In view of these developments, this book will be a rigorous update and development of the editor's earlier work, "Corporate Governance: Economic, Management and Financial Issues." Each chapter, written by an expert in the subject offers a high level review of the topic, embracing material from financial accounting, strategy and economic perspectives.

The first guide to this new financial trend. Credit securitization (also known as asset securitization) is a financial technology for packaging, underwriting, and selling loans in the form of securities. First used in packaging mortgage loans (as in the case of GNMA and other federally insured mortgage-backed securities), credit securitization has grown rapidly and spread to other forms of credit, including auto loans, student loans, credit-card balances, and so on. This book provides lenders and other financial professionals with clear analyses of many actual credit securitization deals. Includes much information unavailable elsewhere.

Make better financial choices, reduce money anxiety, and grow your wealth In Unbiased Investor: Reduce Financial Stress and Keep More of Your Money, Portfolio Manager at CIBC World Markets, Coreen Sol, delivers an inspiring and illuminating roadmap to investing success. In the book, you'll explore the behavioral and psychological roadblocks to achieving optimal results from your portfolio and the strategies you can use to overcome them. You'll learn to focus on basic economic principles--rather than harmful psychological biases--to reduce financial stress and reliably grow wealth. The book also shows you how to: Recognize the decision-making shortcuts (heuristics) we use to navigate and understand the world around us Avoid counter-productive and ineffective risk-management strategies that decrease returns without mitigating risk Consider your own financial goals, personal preferences, and skills in the creation of a strategy to make good financial choices, consistently A powerful and easy-to-follow handbook for everyday investors, Unbiased Investor shows readers from all kinds of background the foundational, straightforward behaviors and habits we need to embrace to realize financial security.

The eagerly awaited second edition of this highly successful book has been greatly expanded from 400 to over 700 pages and contains new material on value at risk, speculative bubbles, volatility effects in financial markets, chaos and neural networks.
Financial Market Analysis deals with the composition of financial markets and the analysis and valuation of traded securities. It describes the use of securities both in constructing and managing portfolios and in contributing to portfolio performance. Particular attention is paid to new types of investment product, different portfolio management strategies, speculation, arbitrage and risk management strategies and to financial market failure.
Financial Market Analysis is an essential text for all finance-related degree courses at undergraduate, postgraduate, and MBA level. It also provides a useful source of reference for financial institutions and professionals in the financial markets.

Principles of Private Firm Valuation

"The past forty years has produced significant theoretical and empirical research on the ways in which the capital markets value the equity shares of publicly traded firms. This research supported the rapid development of the analytical frameworks approach to the valuation of public equity shares. Stanley Feldman, in Principles of Private Firm Valuation, makes a major contribution in furthering this analytical frameworks approach to the valuation of privately held equity shares."
--Timothy G. Sullivan, Professor of Finance, Bentley College, Waltham, Massachusetts

"Principles of Private Firm Valuation offers CFOs of private firms critical insights into the factors that determine private firm value. The managing for value model is particularly useful because it creates a framework to measure the value created by undertaking various business strategies including acquisitions and divestitures. Overall, Principles offers a superlative guide must-read to the numerous and complex valuation issues that owners and managers of private firms face. It is a must read for those interested in how the value of private firms is determined."
--Frank Fiumara, VP & CFO, Curtis Instruments, Inc.

"CFOs of public firms are intimately involved in valuation issues related to acquisitions and divestitures. As private firms are targeted for acquisitions, CFOs of private firms will be increasingly relied upon to offer advice and guidance to owners. For finance professionals that desire to raise their level of preparedness for the valuation questions that will certainly come, Principles of Private Firm Valuation offers an excellent start. Principles clearlyaddresses a number of complex private firm valuation issues including determining the cost of capital, and the importance of transparency and liquidity to establishing the value of a private firm. For those interested in private firm valuation, I highly recommend Principles."
--Mark Beucler, Vice President, Finance, Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer, Lifeline Systems

An in-depth overview of investing in the real world In Goals-Based Portfolio Theory, award-winning Chartered Financial Analyst(R) Franklin J. Parker delivers an insightful and eye-opening discussion of how real people can navigate the financial jungle and achieve their financial goals. The book accepts the reality that the typical investor has specific funding requirements within specified periods of time and a limited amount of wealth to dedicate to those objectives. It then works within those limits to show you how to build an investment portfolio that maximizes the possibility you'll achieve your goals, as well as how to manage the tradeoffs between your goals. In the book, you'll find: Strategies for incorporating taxation and rebalancing into a goals-based portfolio A discussion of the major non-financial risks faced by people engaged in private wealth management An incisive prediction of what the future of wealth management and investment management may look like An indispensable exploration of investing as it actually works in the real world for real people, Goals-Based Portfolio Theory belongs in the library of all investors and their advisors who want to maximize the chances of meeting financial goals.

Explore and understand how investment capital is transforming the world's most critical emerging markets In Power of Capital: An Adventure Capitalist's Journey to a Sustainable Future, distinguished author and Chief Investment Officer at Global Delta Capital, Asha Mehta, shares a simultaneously daring and heartening exploration of rapidly evolving emerging markets. Delivering equal doses of business discussion and geopolitical insight, the author examines the changes gripping the globe and why the average person--and investor--should care. The book provides an on-the-ground perspective informed by the author's personal experiences and visits to far-flung regions of the world. It also shares incisive commentary on issues crucial to continuing global economic growth, including terrorism and instability, corruption and autocracy, and sustainable investing. Power of Capital offers: Illuminating insights of China's new role as a global economic powerhouse Pioneering perspectives of how sustainable investing delivers both alpha and impact Explorations of how globalization and technology disrupt companies and sectors In-depth discussions of data's new and central role as the primary store and creator of value in the modern economy The case for women as the greatest emerging market in the world A page-turning read from a singular and worldly generational leader, Power of Capital: An Adventure Capitalist's Journey to a Sustainable Future offers a unique and thought-provoking trip to the globe's most fascinating emerging markets.

Investing in commercial real estate can provide excellent risk-return opportunities for both the large and small investor. Unlike equity securities, commercial real estate often generates a substantial and predictable cash flow over time--and the compounding effect of this cash flow can significantly enhance the performance of most investment portfolios.
Filled with in-depth insight and practical advice, The Real Estate Investment Handbook is an essential tool for current and aspiring commercial real estate investors looking to develop and evaluate commercial real estate properties.
Throughout the book, experts G. Timothy Haight and Daniel D. Singer offer careful examinations of the various types of commercial real estate available, the measures within the markets used to evaluate their performance, and the intricacies of the markets in which they are traded. The discussions of breakeven analysis, present value, financial leverage, loan packaging, and practical real-life situations found in The Real Estate Investment Handbook will help you make better-informed decisions when investing in properties such as:
* Apartments, condominiums, and time-shares
* Single-family homes
* Self-storage facilities
* Office buildings
* Industrial properties
* Parking lots
* Shopping centers
* Hotels and motels

Successful real estate investing is not just about net income or cash flow; it's about the fit between an investor and an investment. With The Real Estate Investment Handbook as your guide, you'll learn how to choose properties that make sense--and money--for you.

This book provides a concise introduction to convex duality in financial mathematics. Convex duality plays an essential role in dealing with financial problems and involves maximizing concave utility functions and minimizing convex risk measures. Recently, convex and generalized convex dualities have shown to be crucial in the process of the dynamic hedging of contingent claims. Common underlying principles and connections between different perspectives are developed; results are illustrated through graphs and explained heuristically. This book can be used as a reference and is aimed toward graduate students, researchers and practitioners in mathematics, finance, economics, and optimization. Topics include: Markowitz portfolio theory, growth portfolio theory, fundamental theorem of asset pricing emphasizing the duality between utility optimization and pricing by martingale measures, risk measures and its dual representation, hedging and super-hedging and its relationship with linear programming duality and the duality relationship in dynamic hedging of contingent claims

Looking for steady retirement income? Read this book! Turning retirement savings into a steady income is a big step toward a worry-free retirement. This book introduces you to how to add annuities to your investment mix. It helps you evaluate how to select the best annuities for your needs and steer clear of the worst. You’ll learn how different types of annuities can help you turn your retirement savings into a monthly paycheck, protect your investments from market ups and downs, postpone taxes, stay in your home for the rest of your life, and even buy long-term care insurance for less.. Written by an annuity thought leader who is a frequent guest-expert on webcasts, podcasts and radio broadcasts as well as editor and publisher of Retirement Income Journal, the book offers the knowledge earned from interviews with hundreds of annuity industry insiders on their own turf. Get insight into which annuities do (or don’t) provide near-retirees and retirees with solid value. Stretch your savings into lifelong income Ask smarter questions when talking to an agent, broker or adviser Retire with less anxiety about the market Feel more in control of your financial life Annuities For Dummies is the must-have guide for anyone making retirement plans or managing their retirement savings.

Expert guidance for CPAs who want to become marketing savvy, improve profits, and gain satisfaction
This updated Second Edition demonstrates how combining the power of trust with the power of persuasion can help CPAs sell their services more effectively. Each chapter develops a key concept of marketing or selling that's easy to follow and shows how to apply the concepts to any CPA practice. Through a step-by-step approach to developing and mastering a stronger marketing and sales presence, this book focuses on how to dramatically enhance the reader's growth potential. It presents real-world examples from top CPA rainmakers and other marketing and management gurus, including Tom Peters. This updated second edition offers interviews covering Sarbanes-Oxley and the new accounting rules.
Troy Waugh, CPA (Nashville, TN), is founder, President, and CEO of The Rainmaker Academy, a comprehensive three-year leadership, client service, and practice development training program for CPAs.

Learn how to get in on the ground floor of the booming cannabis industry with this comprehensive guide Investing in Cannabis: The Next Great Investment Opportunity examines the rapidly expanding world of cannabis investment. Written by a renowned expert in "vice investing," Investing in Cannabis takes an in-depth look at all aspects of publicly traded stocks in the cannabis industry for medical or recreational use, including: CBD / hemp companies Cannabis oil extraction Cannabis cultivation / agriculture companies Biotech / pharmaceutical companies This book focuses on the status and history of cannabis legalization plus concrete examples that every day investors can use to make intelligent and informed investments in any sector of the modern, legal cannabis industry. With an emphasis on good lists and data, the author guides readers through the ins and outs of the booming cannabis industry and attempts to distinguish between future breakout success stories and future busts. Investing in Cannabis is perfect for any person or institutional investor seeking to diversify their portfolio to include investments in this up-and-coming industry.

A valuable reference for understanding operational risk

"Operational Risk with Excel and VBA" is a practical guide that only discusses statistical methods that have been shown to work in an operational risk management context. It brings together a wide variety of statistical methods and models that have proven their worth, and contains a concise treatment of the topic. This book provides readers with clear explanations, relevant information, and comprehensive examples of statistical methods for operational risk management in the real world.

Nigel Da Costa Lewis (Stamford, CT) is president and CEO of StatMetrics, a quantitative research boutique. He received his PhD from Cambridge University.

Financial risk management has become a popular practice amongst financial institutions to protect against the adverse effects of uncertainty caused by fluctuations in interest rates, exchange rates, commodity prices, and equity prices. New financial instruments and mathematical techniques are continuously developed and introduced in financial practice. These techniques are being used by an increasing number of firms, traders and financial risk managers across various industries. "Risk and Financial Management: Mathematical and Computational Methods" confronts the many issues and controversies, and explains the fundamental concepts that underpin financial risk management. Provides a comprehensive introduction to the core topics of risk and financial management. Adopts a pragmatic approach, focused on computational, rather than just theoretical, methods. Bridges the gap between theory and practice in financial risk management Includes coverage of utility theory, probability, options and derivatives, stochastic volatility and value at risk. Suitable for students of risk, mathematical finance, and financial risk management, and finance practitioners. Includes extensive reference lists, applications and suggestions for further reading.

"Risk and Financial Management: Mathematical and Computational Methods" is ideally suited to both students of mathematical finance with little background in economics and finance, and students of financial risk management, as well as finance practitioners requiring a clearer understanding of the mathematical and computational methods they use every day. It combines the required level of rigor, to support the theoretical developments, with a practicalflavour through many examples and applications.

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Quantitative Methods for Finance and Investments" ensures that readers will gain a reasonable degree of comfort and proficiency in applying elementary mathematics to financial analysis in a variety of areas. All of the methodology in this book is geared toward the development, implementation, and analysis of financial models to solve problems encountered by both finance students and practitioners. The book:
analyzes theoretical and practitioner-oriented models long with the mathematics required to construct them
presents the most essential mathematical techniques and their applications to financial analysis
provides dozens of practical applications, examples, and end-of-chapter exercises with detailed solutions
demonstrates key spreadsheet applications of the mathematical models in chapter appendices
emphasizes practical applications of modeling technique.

Hands-on, practical strategies to build your financial future In To the Moon Investing: Visually Mapping Your Winning Stock-Market Portfolio, veteran asset investor Kelly James Frank delivers an exciting and intuitive fresh approach that enables you to navigate an increasingly volatile market through the use of tailored portfolio maps. . In the book, you'll learn how to understand risk and how it affects you as an investor, how to prepare for your investing future, and how to uncover why you want to invest. You'll also shore up your financial literacy and explore the difference between growth and value strategies. The book offers a vivid and innovative approach to investing that you'll actually have fun reading and its engaging philosophy ensures you'll be able to put your newfound knowledge to work immediately. You'll discover: The interconnected five factors that determine a share's current and future value Summaries, charts and sketches to help you remember the book's key insights and that you can use to record your own market observations and understanding An exploration of macroeconomics that sheds light on how decisions made by the Fed and the government can impact you as an individual investor The perfect combination of fun and informative, To the Moon Investing: Visually Mapping Your Winning Stock-Market Portfolio is an energetic and authoritative playbook to building a resilient and profitable investment portfolio.

Capital Asset Investment offers a detailed exposition of the theory, quantitative methods, and applications of capital budgeting. Comprehensive in scope, the author covers all the major topics in the field, providing a balanced treatment of the various approaches to capital project evaluation, exploring their strengths and weaknesses.

Capital budgeting decisions involve the largest tangible investments for any firm – long-term commitments that are generally irreversible in the short run. Such decisions directly impact on shareholder value and the future viability of the firm. In this book, the author offers a harmonious blend of the 'old' techniques, such as the MAPI method of capital investment appraisal, with the newer, such as the Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM) and the most recent innovation, the use of real options.

Capital Asset Investment: Strategy, Tactics and Tools is essential reading for financial managers, industrial and manufacturing engineering managers and all those involved in forward planning and business strategy formulation and execution. The book will also be of use to students of finance.

Confidence and conviction are the keys to success in asset management. Analysts projecting these traits become more likely candidates for promotion; clients gravitate to portfolio managers who radiate assurance about future performance. However, these qualities do a disservice to optimal decision making and long-term investment performance. The future is too complex to justify such levels of confidence. In Reasons to Pass, the seasoned practitioner Ralph Birchmeier argues that an optimal portfolio-building strategy means patiently waiting for the few investments worthy of capital allocation. He outlines the principles required for success then examines specific reasons to pass on investments, detailing behavioral biases that disrupt optimal decision making. Although professional and retail investors alike are tempted by various opportunities, the wisdom of experience proves the value of prudence. An investing strategy built to last requires humility and the willingness to accept uncertainty; most of the time, it's best to pass. Reasons to Pass brings investing back to the basics, helping readers navigate the complexity of the financial landscape and bringing clarity to the investment process. By underscoring the perils of overconfidence and the importance of humility, this book offers invaluable new perspective on investing for the long term.

This book is a detailed and step-by-step introduction to the mathematical foundations of ordinary and partial differential equations, their approximation by the finite difference method and applications to computational finance. The book is structured so that it can be read by beginners, novices and expert users. Part A Mathematical Foundation for One-Factor Problems Chapters 1 to 7 introduce the mathematical and numerical analysis concepts that are needed to understand the finite difference method and its application to computational finance. Part B Mathematical Foundation for Two-Factor Problems Chapters 8 to 13 discuss a number of rigorous mathematical techniques relating to elliptic and parabolic partial differential equations in two space variables. In particular, we develop strategies to preprocess and modify a PDE before we approximate it by the finite difference method, thus avoiding ad-hoc and heuristic tricks. Part C The Foundations of the Finite Difference Method (FDM) Chapters 14 to 17 introduce the mathematical background to the finite difference method for initial boundary value problems for parabolic PDEs. It encapsulates all the background information to construct stable and accurate finite difference schemes. Part D Advanced Finite Difference Schemes for Two-Factor Problems Chapters 18 to 22 introduce a number of modern finite difference methods to approximate the solution of two factor partial differential equations. This is the only book we know of that discusses these methods in any detail. Part E Test Cases in Computational Finance Chapters 23 to 26 are concerned with applications based on previous chapters. We discuss finite difference schemes for a wide range of one-factor and two-factor problems. This book is suitable as an entry-level introduction as well as a detailed treatment of modern methods as used by industry quants and MSc/MFE students in finance. The topics have applications to numerical analysis, science and engineering. More on computational finance and the author's online courses, see www.datasim.nl.

Don't let money get in the way of your kids' best education 529 & Education Savings Plans For Dummies helps you sort through the vast amount of information about education savings accounts and choose the plans that are best for you and your family. A college or private K-12 education is generally parents' single largest expense for their children. 529 plans and 530 plans (Coverdell accounts) are relatively solid investment vehicles that can make saving for college much easier, providing tax advantages that other types of investments can't match. Education savings can be part of your overall wealth accumulation strategy, and this book can show you which plans are right for you, help you decide when to start saving, and guide you through determining how much to save per year in order to meet your goals--and help your kids meet theirs. Learn about the different types of tax-sheltered and tax-advantaged ways to save for education Create a saving and investment strategy that makes sense for your family Demystify the 529 and 530 plan rules and maximize your tax advantage Help set your kids on the path to success and to their college of choice This is the perfect Dummies guide for parents or family members who want to begin saving for a college or K-12 education and who may want to supplement their current savings with tax-sheltered, education-specific accounts, or tax-advantaged investment accounts that may be used for education funding.

A detailed look at the worst M&A deals ever and the lessons learned from them
It's common knowledge that about half of all merger and acquisition (M&A) transactions destroy value for the buyer's shareholders, and about three-quarters fall short of the expectations prevailing at the time the deal is announced. In Deals from Hell, Robert Bruner, one of the foremost thinkers and educators in this field, uncovers the real reasons for these mishaps by taking a closer look at twelve specific instances of M&A failure. Through these real-world examples, he shows readers what went wrong and why, and converts these examples into cautionary tales for executives who need to know how they can successfully navigate their own M&A deals. These page-turning business narratives in M&A failure provide much-needed guidance in this area of business. By addressing the key factors to M&A success and failure, this comprehensive guide illustrates the best ways to analyze, design, and implement M&A deals. Filled with in-depth insights, expert advice, and valuable lessons gleaned from other M&A transactions, Deals from Hell helps readers avoid the common pitfalls associated with this field and presents them with a clear framework for thinking about how to make any M&A transaction a success.

Be your own financial planner and create a winning strategy to achieve your money goals Do you want to learn and apply the strategies that experts use to grow and protect wealth? In Smart Money Strategy, popular financial planner Luke Smith comprehensively reveals the principles, methods and tactics that real financial planners use with their clients. Every person's--and every family's--financial journey is different. There's no silver bullet or one-size-fits-all approach. But there are financial strategies that can be applied, no matter what stage you're at in life, to get your money working harder for you with less stress. Smart Money Strategy will help you to define your priorities and create a personalised, actionable plan to achieve your goals. You'll learn effective strategies to manage your income, reduce your debts, and maximise your investment, superannuation and retirement outcomes. Even better, you'll learn how different strategies can be stacked together for maximum benefit. In other words, you'll learn how you can stack the financial odds in your favour! You'll discover: The basics: 5 truths about money and the 5 foundations you need to get started The actual strategies used by financial planners when it comes to cash flow, risk assessment, investing, protecting wealth, retirement, and estate planning How smart planning can minimise fees and taxes on your investments How to combine your money strategies and put together your own detailed financial plan From adopting a money mindset to protecting your assets, with Smart Money Strategy you'll uncover the secrets to achieving your financial goals. Whether you want a hands-on DIY approach, or you're looking for the essentials you need to talk more confidently with your own financial planner, this book will help you create a tailored plan for growing your wealth.

Presents a multitude of topics relevant to the quantitative finance community by combining the best of the theory with the usefulness of applications Written by accomplished teachers and researchers in the field, this book presents quantitative finance theory through applications to specific practical problems and comes with accompanying coding techniques in R and MATLAB, and some generic pseudo-algorithms to modern finance. It also offers over 300 examples and exercises that are appropriate for the beginning student as well as the practitioner in the field. The Quantitative Finance book is divided into four parts. Part One begins by providing readers with the theoretical backdrop needed from probability and stochastic processes. We also present some useful finance concepts used throughout the book. In part two of the book we present the classical Black-Scholes-Merton model in a uniquely accessible and understandable way. Implied volatility as well as local volatility surfaces are also discussed. Next, solutions to Partial Differential Equations (PDE), wavelets and Fourier transforms are presented. Several methodologies for pricing options namely, tree methods, finite difference method and Monte Carlo simulation methods are also discussed. We conclude this part with a discussion on stochastic differential equations (SDE's). In the third part of this book, several new and advanced models from current literature such as general Lvy processes, nonlinear PDE's for stochastic volatility models in a transaction fee market, PDE's in a jump-diffusion with stochastic volatility models and factor and copulas models are discussed. In part four of the book, we conclude with a solid presentation of the typical topics in fixed income securities and derivatives. We discuss models for pricing bonds market, marketable securities, credit default swaps (CDS) and securitizations. Classroom-tested over a three-year period with the input of students and experienced practitioners Emphasizes the volatility of financial analyses and interpretations Weaves theory with application throughout the book Utilizes R and MATLAB software programs Presents pseudo-algorithms for readers who do not have access to any particular programming system Supplemented with extensive author-maintained web site that includes helpful teaching hints, data sets, software programs, and additional content Quantitative Finance is an ideal textbook for upper-undergraduate and beginning graduate students in statistics, financial engineering, quantitative finance, and mathematical finance programs. It will also appeal to practitioners in the same fields.