The Brand Finance Brand Guardianship Index 2025 has published its list of the world's top 100 CEOs, evaluated based on brand strength scores compiled from insights from analysts, investors, and corporate management experts.

Leading the ranking is Satya Nadella from Microsoft, boasting a brand strength score of 95.6, followed closely by Tim Cook of Apple at 93.2 and Jensen Huang of NVIDIA, also at 93.2. Completing the top five are Benedetto Vigna of Ferrari with a score of 89.9, and Sundar Pichai of Google at 89.3. Elon Musk of Tesla notably climbed from nineteenth to sixth place this year with a score of 89.1, earning him a spot among the premier executives.

Other prominent CEOs in the top ten include Dr. Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber of ADNOC, Lei Jun of Xiaomi, Sashi Jagdishan of HDFC Bank, and Wang Chuanfu of BYD.

The index reveals that American CEOs lead the rankings with forty-two representatives, followed by nine from China, seven from India, and five from Germany, while no other nation has more than three.

The banking sector is the most prevalent, featuring fourteen CEOs, followed by industries such as automobiles, technology, and retail.

The educational backgrounds of these CEOs predominantly include engineering, business, and finance.

Joshua Kobza, the 37-year-old CEO of Tim Hortons, is the youngest in the ranking, whereas Zhengfei Ren, the 80-year-old CEO of Huawei, is the eldest.

Approximately half of the CEOs are in their fifties, nearly forty are in their sixties, eleven are under forty-nine, and four are over seventy.

The report also outlines the primary factors influencing CEO reputation in 2025. The foremost trait identified is genuine concern for employees, surpassing last year’s focus on sustainability.

Other significant characteristics include the capability to inspire positive change, reliability, and a deep understanding of customer needs.

Among the top executives, Satya Nadella’s leadership at Microsoft, characterized by a strong commitment to cloud computing and artificial intelligence, is underscored by his initial one billion dollar investment in OpenAI in 2019, which has evolved into a multibillion-dollar partnership resulting in an average annual brand value growth of twenty-six percent.

Jensen Huang’s achievements are also highlighted, with NVIDIA’s brand value soaring by ninety-eight percent to an impressive eighty-seven point nine billion US dollars, earning it a top ten spot among the world’s most valuable brands for 2025.

The index further indicates a rising trend of top CEOs being appointed from outside their organizations.

In 2023, seventeen percent of CEOs were externally appointed; this number grew to twenty percent in 2024 and approached thirty-nine percent in 2025.

Importantly, all the women listed in the index were hired from outside, unlike half of their male counterparts who advanced through internal promotions.

Lenna Nair, the CEO of Chanel and the highest-ranked woman at nineteenth, exemplifies this trend.

Additionally, the index highlights that Thailand is represented within the top 100 by Kongkrapan Intarajang of PTT, who ranks sixty-sixth with a brand strength score of 76.4, while several CEOs from ASEAN, including Wee Ee Cheong of UOB Bank in Singapore, Khairussaleh Ramli of Maybank in Malaysia, and Tao Duc Thang of Viettel in Vietnam, also achieved notable rankings.