Professor VanHorne has focused his research on issues in corporate finance, valuation, and on the term structure of interest rates. His some 60 articles in finance, economic, and management journals often involve empirical inquiry. He is the author of five books, three of which - Financial Management and Policy, 12th edition; Financial Market Rates and Flows, 6th edition; and Fundamentals of Financial Management, 12th edition, (coauthor) - have been widely used as texts in the U.S.A. and abroad. In addition, he has written 24 cases used in MBA courses in the school.

James VanHorne is the A.P. Giannini Professor of Finance, Emeritus, having come to Stanford in 1965. He has taught MBA courses in corporate finance, mergers and acquisitions, corporate restructuring, fixed-income securities, and government and nonprofit debt financing. He was the first recipient of the distinguished teaching award by MBA students, and recipient again in 1997. He is the past president of the American Finance Association and of the Western Finance Association, and has been an active member of the Financial Economists Roundtable. He also has served as Associate Editor of several leading finance journals.

He received his BA from DePauw University and MBA and PhD degrees from Northwestern University. In the mid-1970s he served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of the U.S. Treasury, and has served on several Federal and State of California commissions and advisory groups. VanHorne presently serves on two corporate and two nonprofit boards, and has served on five other boards in the past. His research involves such things as capital budgeting, the effect of inflation, interest rate theory and behavior, corporate finance, and financial innovation.