We first derive the exterior area theorem for univalent functions directly from Green's theorem, then obtain the coefficient bound needed for the Koebe quarter theorem.
Suppose is univalent on and has a Laurent series
For , the image of , , is a regular simple closed curve. By the Jordan curve theorem the curve has one bounded and one unbounded complementary component. The image of lies in the unbounded component, since it is connected, avoids the curve by injectivity and contains points near infinity. It fills that component: any finite boundary limit of the image has preimages bounded by , and a convergent preimage subsequence must land on or else give an interior image point. Thus no boundary of the image lies inside that complementary component. The curve is positively oriented about its bounded interior, since the exterior is on the right of and a holomorphic map with nonzero derivative preserves orientation. Green's formula gives its enclosed area as
For completeness, the positive Fourier mode is and the negative modes are . On multiplying by the conjugate series and integrating, all unequal-frequency products integrate to zero by Fourier orthogonality. The equal-frequency products give and , respectively; the constant term gives zero. The Laurent series and its differentiated series converge uniformly on the circle, since , so these operations are justified. Nonnegativity of yields . Letting , or first doing so for every finite partial sum, gives
No regularity of the map on the unit circle has been assumed.
Now let be a normalized univalent function. Its only zero is at zero, so , extended there by the value one, is holomorphic and nowhere zero. On the simply connected disc it has a holomorphic square root with value one at zero. Its odd square-root transform is
This is an odd function which is holomorphic and normalized. It is also univalent: gives and hence . If , oddness gives , so , forcing . Thus is univalent on the exterior disc, with expansion
Applying the area bound to its first negative coefficient proves the second coefficient bound for normalized univalent functions, .
Let be any point omitted by . It is nonzero. Postcomposition with a Möbius map gives another normalized univalent function
whose denominator does not vanish. Applying the second coefficient bound both to and to gives
Every omitted point therefore has modulus at least , proving
This establishes the Koebe quarter theorem from the allowed area formula.
Sharpness is witnessed by the Koebe function . It has the required value and derivative at zero. The equality simplifies to , and makes it injective. Moreover,
Thus is omitted, so no larger universal radius is possible. In fact shows its image is the plane slit along .
Without univalence take a real and
It is entire, with and , but it omits , a point of modulus less than , since the exponential never vanishes. It is genuinely not univalent on the disc: the distinct points lie there and both give exponential value . Even its derivative never vanishes, illustrating why local conformality alone does not give the quarter-disc inclusion.