COROLLARY 2.3. lf Tis the product of two nonnegative matrices, so are T, and T,. Proof. By Theorem 2.2, T is similar to a nonnegative diagonal matrix. It is easily seen that Tl and T2 are also similar to diagonal matrices and that their eigenvalues are nonnegative. Hence, by Theorem 2.2 again, they are products of two nonnegative matrices. n 3. THREE NONNEGATIVE MATRICES In this section, we will give a sufficient condition, in terms of Ballantine’s characterization of the products of three positive matrices, for a matrix to be