The Brand Finance Brand Guardianship Index 2025 has published its list of the world’s top 100 CEOs, determined by brand strength scores derived from insights from analysts, investors, and corporate management experts.

Leading the ranking is Microsoft’s Satya Nadella, who boasts a brand strength score of 95.6, followed closely by Apple's Tim Cook at 93.2 and NVIDIA's Jensen Huang, also at 93.2. The top five is completed by Ferrari's Benedetto Vigna at 89.9 and Google’s Sundar Pichai at 89.3. Tesla’s Elon Musk, who surged from nineteenth place last year to sixth this year with a score of 89.1, is among the notable leaders.

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

The index indicates that American CEOs lead the list with forty-two representatives, trailed by nine from China, seven from India, and five from Germany, with no other nation yielding more than three.

The banking sector has the highest representation with fourteen CEOs, while industries such as automotive, technology, and retail follow behind.

The most prevalent educational backgrounds for these CEOs include engineering, business, and finance.

At thirty-seven years old, Joshua Kobza, the CEO of Tim Hortons, is the youngest on the list, while Zhengfei Ren, the 80-year-old head of Huawei, is the oldest.

About fifty percent of the CEOs are in their fifties, nearly forty are in their sixties, eleven are under forty-nine, and four are aged over seventy.

The findings also highlight key factors influencing CEO reputation in 2025, with genuine concern for employees taking the lead, surpassing last year's focus on sustainability.

Other significant traits include the capacity to inspire positive change, trustworthiness, and an understanding of customer needs.

Among the top executives, Satya Nadella's leadership at Microsoft stands out, characterized by a strong commitment to cloud computing and artificial intelligence. His initial one billion dollar investment in OpenAI in 2019 has developed into a multibillion-dollar partnership, resulting in an average annual brand value increase of twenty-six percent.

Jensen Huang's achievements are also recognized, as NVIDIA's brand value skyrocketed by ninety-eight percent to eighty-seven point nine billion US dollars, earning it a top ten spot among the world's most valuable brands for 2025.

Additionally, the index indicates a growing trend of externally appointed CEOs.

In 2023, seventeen percent of CEOs were hired from outside their companies; this rose to twenty percent in 2024 and almost reached thirty-nine percent in 2025.

Notably, all women on the index were introduced from outside, while half of the male CEOs were promoted internally.

Chanel CEO Lenna Nair, ranked nineteenth, exemplifies this trend.

Furthermore, the index highlights Thailand’s presence in the top 100 through Kongkrapan Intarajang of PTT, who stands at sixty-sixth with a brand strength score of 76.4. Several ASEAN CEOs, such as Wee Ee Cheong of UOB Bank in Singapore, Khairussaleh Ramli of Maybank in Malaysia, and Tao Duc Thang of Viettel in Vietnam, also achieved strong rankings.