It depends on what area of finance you're looking at.

Here's a book I used for Corporate Finance and valuations of companies: https://www.amazon.ca/Valuation-Measuring-Managing-Value-Com...

I was not familiar with the term "zero growth return" until I saw you use it here, and some Googling led me to this book:

http://www.amazon.com/Valuation-Measuring-Managing-Companies...

Just out of curiosity... would you think that the kind of material on valuations contained in this text (or similar ones) would be of value to startup founders, especially vis-a-vis negotiating with investors? Or is it all stuff that doesn't come into play until later, when you're dealing with private equity or trading on Wall Street exchanges?