At least seven firms in the U.S. mutual fund and ETF business are among the most trustworthy companies in the world, according to the folks at a news magazine and a market data specialist.

Robert Lloyd "Bob" Reynolds Putnam Investments President, CEO

The teams at Newsweek and Statista have unveiled their first ever list of the World's Most Trustworthy Companies. The inaugural list includes 1,000 companies (whittled down from a list, pulled from 21 countries, of all publicly traded companies with more than $500 million in revenue) and is based on an evaluation of "three main public pillars of trust": customer trust, employee trust, and investor trust. To do that, the Statista and Newsweek folks surveyed 70,000 people in those countries and used "social listening" to gather more than 975,000 mentions of the companies on social media, in news articles, and more. (Companies involved in significant lawsuits or scandals were excluded.)

In the U.S. mutual fund and ETF business, companies on the 2023 list include: the Hartford, Manulife (parent of John Hancock), Power Corporation of Canada (parent of Great-West, which is parent of Putnam), Raymond James, RBC, Sun Life (parent of MFS), and Voya Financial.

"Trust is at the core of so many decisions that we make every day. From shopping and investing to where we choose to work, it is an essential measurement for the important choices we make," writes Nancy Cooper, global editor in chief of Newsweek. "Consumers evaluated companies on statements such as, 'I trust in this company to treat me fairly as its customer,' 'I trust that this company is competently led' and 'I believe this company treats its employees fairly.'"

The new list of the World's Most Trustworthy Companies in 2023 also includes at least five firms in the U.S. retirement plan recordkeeping business, plus at least one key ally to recordkeepers. Our sister publication 401kWire has more details. 

Edited by: Neil Anderson, Managing Editor


Stay ahead of the news ... Sign up for our email alerts now
CLICK HERE