06 How To Master Corporate Finance Models

Seventeen corporate finance frameworks, each taught end to end — with the worked models to run them.

Corporate finance is the discipline of allocating capital well. This handbook teaches all seventeen frameworks in the Corporate Finance category — one chapter each — from pricing the cost of capital and appraising the investment, to funding the business and returning cash to shareholders. From WACC and CAPM to Real Options, the Share Buyback and Capital Rationing.

What you get

The complete PDF handbook plus seventeen worked Excel models — one for every framework in the book. Blue input cells you change, formula cells that respond, and a Read-me tab on each, so you can run the numbers on your own assumptions.

How every chapter is built

Read one and you can build any. Each framework follows the same thirteen-section rhythm: the question it answers, what it is, who uses it, its anatomy, inputs and outputs, how to build it step by step, a worked example, strengths, limits and pitfalls, industry notes, how it connects to the other frameworks, modern relevance, using AI on it, and a practitioner’s checklist.

The seventeen frameworks

WACC, CAPM, Optimal Capital Structure, ROIC, EVA, Hurdle Rate, Dividend Policy, Share Buyback, NPV Appraisal, IRR Appraisal, Payback Period, Real Options, Refinancing, Lease-versus-Buy, Make-versus-Buy, Cost of Debt and Capital Rationing.

The learning path

The chapters are ordered as a single connected build, not an alphabetical list — from pricing the capital, to appraising and allocating it, to funding the business and returning the cash.

Who it's for

CFOs, finance directors, treasury teams, investment bankers and analysts who must justify where capital goes and defend the number in the boardroom.

How to use it

Work straight through to master the category, or jump to a single framework when you need it for live work.

Book 06 of the Business Framework Library, part of The Investment Banking Practitioner’s Handbook Series. Master this category on its own, or reach for the Business Framework Compendium when you want the one-page reference to all 467 frameworks.

By John Colley — Cambridge University MA · MBA with Distinction, Bayes Business School · 30+ years in investment banking, M&A and private equity.