Mark E. Zmijewski is Charles T. Horngren Professor of Accounting Emeritus at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. Over more than 30 years at Booth, he held the Charles T. Horngren Professorship and, earlier, the Leon Carroll Marshall Professorship. He also served as Deputy Dean, Associate Dean for PhD Studies, and Faculty Director of the Center for Research in Security Prices (CRSP). His fields of specialization are accounting, economics, and finance, applied to valuation, financial analysis, and security analysis.
Professor Zmijewski is a Senior Consultant to Econic Partners, an economic and financial consulting firm. He is a Senior Advisor to, and a member of the Investment Committee of, Patron Capital Partners, a private equity firm. He was a Founding Partner of Chicago Partners, LLC, which was acquired by Navigant Consulting. He subsequently served as Managing Director of Navigant Economics, a Navigant Consulting subsidiary, and as a member of Navigant Consulting’s Corporate Executive Committee. He was also an academic affiliate of Charles River Associates.
Education and Academic Appointments
Professor Zmijewski earned the following degrees from the State University of New York at Buffalo: BS (1976), MBA (1981), and PhD (1983), with a major in accounting and minors in economics and finance. He has held teaching appointments at the State University of New York at Buffalo, York University (Toronto, Canada), and the University of Chicago. His teaching spans three areas: (i) accounting, including financial accounting, managerial accounting, and advanced accounting and mergers and acquisitions; (ii) finance, including corporate finance, financial strategy and corporate transactions, financial analysis, and the valuation of companies and corporate transactions; and (iii) entrepreneurship. His teaching honors include the Business Information Professional of the Year — Education award from Beta Alpha Psi (2007), the Hillel J. Einhorn Excellence in Teaching Award in the Executive MBA Program (1999), and the Emory Williams Award for Excellence in Teaching at the University of Chicago (1988).
Research and Publications
Professor Zmijewski’s research addresses firm valuation and the use of information by capital market participants to value securities. He has published in peer-reviewed academic journals in accounting and financial economics, including the Journal of Accounting Research, the Journal of Accounting and Economics, and The Accounting Review. He is co-author, with Professor Robert Holthausen of The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, of the textbook Corporate Valuation: Theory, Evidence & Practice (Cambridge Business Publishers; 1st edition 2014, 2nd edition 2020), which covers the valuation of companies, parts of companies, and securities issued by companies. He has served as Associate Editor of The Accounting Review and as a member of the Editorial Boards of The Accounting Review and the Journal of Accounting Research.
Consulting and Expert Engagements
Professor Zmijewski has served as a consultant and as an expert witness in litigation and arbitration. His engagements include matters before U.S. state and federal courts, the Ontario Superior Court of Justice (Canada), the Supreme Court of Victoria (Australia), the Supreme Court of New South Wales (Australia), the Federal Court of Australia, the Supreme Court of Bermuda, the Surface Transportation Board, the U.S. Tax Court, U.S. and Canadian competition and regulatory agencies, and U.S. and international arbitration tribunals. His engagements have addressed various subject areas including:
- Business and Securities Valuation — valuation of corporate transactions, companies and parts of companies, intangible assets and intellectual property, and securities.
- Mergers and Acquisitions — appraisal and price disputes, analysis of merger synergies and cost efficiencies, corporate transactions, and the process of purchasing and selling companies.
- Antitrust Litigation — analysis of merger efficiencies, failing firm defense, measuring economic profits and returns, and financial analyses of alleged anticompetitive behavior.
- Securities Litigation — Rule 10b-5, Section 11, Section 12, ERISA, Martin Act, and insider trading matters.
- Material Adverse Changes — analysis of MAC and MAE claims.
- Solvency and Ability to Pay — fraudulent conveyance analysis, solvency assessment, and ability to pay government fines.
- Commercial and Stockholder Disputes — measurement of damages, accounting analyses, and economic assessment of transactions.
- Accounting Issues — measurement and analysis of revenue, cost structures, profitability, rates of return, interest rates, and other financial metrics.
Industry Experience
The frameworks and tools applied in Professor Zmijewski’s work are generally applicable across industries. He has applied his expertise in a broad range of sectors, including airline, automotive, chemical, computer hardware and software, credit card, energy, entertainment, financial services, for-profit education, health care, insurance, heavy and light manufacturing, pharmaceutical, real estate investment, motorsports, retail, technology, telecommunications, and transportation, among others.
