12.1 Why this book?

Many books have been written about valuation. In what is deemed one of the best guides for corporate valuation, namely Valuation, the co-authors Tim Koller, Marc Goedhart and David Wessels indicate that valuation is an age-old methodology in finance. Its intellectual origins lie in the present value method of capital budgeting and in the valuation approach developed by Professors Merton Miller and Franco Modigliani (both Nobel laureates) in their 1961 Journal of Business article entitled “Dividend Policy, Growth and the Valuation of Shares”.1 Since then, many other books and international economic articles have been written about business valuation.

The main objective of this book – which basically consists of 5 papers written as part of my Ph.D. research – is to investigate, from a Dutch legal perspective, various questions in respect of valuation. More specifically, this book investigates various (conceptual) questions about valuation in respect of (i) corporate law proceedings and (ii) financial restructurings or reorganizations of companies.

Below, I will discuss the various chapters, starting with the problem statement and the various research questions.