The Most Powerful Women in Finance

October 1, 2025 9:50 AM

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The financial services industry is experiencing unprecedented market and technological change, increasingly being transformed—and challenged by—artificial intelligence, blockchain, digital assets and the growing use cases for their implementation.

While digital banking, mobile wallets and instant payments continue to make transactions faster, more convenient and more accessible for customers, the rise of on-chain finance, digital assets and stablecoin payments represents the traditional financial industry's greatest new frontier, with companies moving quickly to develop their digital-asset strategies and position themselves for the future. Taken together, the effects of the digital economy—notably, the ability to reduce costs, maximize speed and open up services to new customers—is propelling a greater democratization of financial services.

The 25 leaders ranked as The Most Powerful Women in Finance are at the forefront of this technological transformation, adapting to change, driving results and exploring new opportunities that sit at the intersection of business and innovation.

In the top spot for the third consecutive year is JPMorganChase's Mary Callahan Erdoes, CEO, asset and wealth management, who is spearheading an industry-leading initiative to make AI central to how her 30,000 team members work. Yie-Hsin Hung, president and CEO, State Street Investment Management (#2) is expanding the company's presence in private markets and exchange-traded fund (ETF) servicing. Abigail Johnson, chair and CEO of Fidelity Investments (#3)—one of the first financial executives to recognize the coming power of digital assets, and the first traditional firm to launch an institutional digital-asset custody and trading platform, Fidelity Digital Assets, in October 2018—was pushing the bounds of innovation again when Fidelity became one of the first firms to launch a spot Bitcoin ETF in January 2024. Edward Jones Managing Partner Penny Pennington (#4) started a venture-investing arm to leverage more innovative technologies, and Thasunda Brown Duckett, president and CEO of TIAA (#5) launched a proprietary generative AI platform last year.

Collectively, these leaders are redefining how the industry serves its customers, devising business strategies that will unlock new markets, making more aggressive investments in emerging technologies to generate more revenue while reducing costs, and give their customers and employees better, faster and cheaper digital products and platforms that meet their changing needs.

Mary Callahan Erdoes, JPMorganChase

CEO, Asset and Wealth Management

Mary Callahan Erdoes arrives for a meeting seven minutes late, apologizing profusely. The CEO of JPMorganChase's mammoth asset and wealth management (AWM) business moved into the company's gleaming new headquarters at 270 Park Avenue a day earlier and underestimated the return time to her office after escorting a client to the entrance. "This building is the craziest thing that's happened to New York City in a long time," she said.

If you really want to see something crazy, look at the high-energy Erdoes' workload—and her results. Over the past year she's shepherded the bank's high-net-worth clients through a volatile spring, flown around the world to meet with heads of state and billionaires, spoken at big forums, including the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, and even helped fetch a record price for a venerable sports franchise. She also played a high-profile role as the most senior member of Chairman and CEO Jamie Dimon's operating committee.

Read more about Erdoes' leadership.

Yie-Hsin Hung, State Street Investment Management

President and CEO

Yie-Hsin Hung entered the financial services sector after earning a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering from Northwestern University and an MBA from Harvard University. Her first stop after college: investment banking.

Although she enjoyed "the fast-paced environment and the opportunity to work on complex, high-stakes transactions" in investment banking, Hung eventually desired work that was "more enduring and purpose-driven." She found work as the CEO of New York Life Investments from 2015 to 2022 and today as president and CEO of State Street Investment Management, formerly State Street Global Advisors. She's been head of the world's fourth largest investment management firm since 2022.

Learn more about Hung's career.

Abigail Johnson, Fidelity Investments

Chair and CEO

Abigail Johnson, known to all as Abby, runs her family's old-school asset management firm with a focus on alternative investments that couldn't even be traded on an exchange a year ago.

Fidelity Digital Assets, which provides custodial and trading services for the crypto holdings of institutional and high-net worth clients, operates as an independent subsidiary and has become a core contributor to the $6.4 trillion-asset company, which grew to $32.7 billion in 2024 revenues. (The company has about $16.4 trillion under administration.)

Read more about Johnson's leadership.

Penny Pennington, Edward Jones

Managing Partner

Pennington is moving Edward Jones from its traditional role as a stock brokerage firm into a new orientation as a financial-planning company.

Of her 20,000 financial advisors, a record for the firm, she now has 5,000 Certified Financial Planners. This ramp-up will help Edward Jones "meet a growing and urgent need for trusted, personal financial advice," in a world where 52% of affluent households want financial planning, compared to 29% who sought this type of advice in 2018, she said. This year, Edward Jones also launched its Generations private client service, its first foray into high-end wealth management.

"We're meeting this moment by expanding how we serve, moving toward a client-segmented model and aligning our compensation with the value we deliver to clients and their families," she said in an email.

Learn more about Pennington's plans for growth.

Thasunda Brown Duckett, TIAA

President and CEO

When TIAA launched an IRA product broadening access to its proprietary annuity products on March 10, the stock market recorded one of its most volatile days in years. Investors were fretting over the impact of tariffs and the possibility of a recession.

The day's roller coaster ride reinforced what TIAA president and CEO Thasunda Brown Duckett already believed about the value of lifetime income annuities.

"Guaranteed income isn't a luxury, it's a necessity," Duckett said, arguing that people want security they can count on regardless of market swings. "That's why we're committed to expanding access to guaranteed lifetime income solutions, in both the institutional and retail markets."

Read more about Duckett's leadership.

Adena Friedman, Nasdaq

Chair and CEO

In her eight-year tenure as Nasdaq CEO, Adena Friedman has led a massive transformation of the iconic stock exchange into a global financial services technology powerhouse. Nasdaq has diversified beyond its core listings and index business into a business partner for banking and capital markets, expanding its reach into treasury, risk and compliance management and regulatory reporting.

Anchored by a $10.5 billion acquisition of software giant Adenza in 2023, Nasdaq under Friedman's leadership has most recently built a suite of compliance and anti-financial crime services used by most globally systemic institutions through AI-driven models for areas such as AML due diligence or sanctions assessments.

Learn more about Friedman's plans.

Katy Knox, Bank of America

President, Bank of America Private Bank

Having amassed 39 years of experience in financial services, Katy Knox is one of the longest-tenured female leaders in the U.S. private banking sector. Knox, president of Bank of America's Private Bank since 2018 and a member of BoA's executive management team, views her visibility as both a responsibility and an opportunity.

"As Marian Wright Edelman said, 'You can't be what you can't see.' For many associates at Bank of America, especially those early in their careers, it's powerful to see leaders who reflect the communities we serve," said Knox. "Our industry has a unique opportunity to engage emerging sources of wealth with fresh perspectives and talent, and we're committed to developing that talent internally."

Learn more about Knox's career.

Lindsay Hans, Bank of America

President, Co-Head of Merrill Wealth Management

In just her second year as president and co-head of Bank of America's Merrill Wealth Management business, Lindsay Hans has met those challenges head on.

In partnership with Eric Schrimpf, president and co-head of the 25,000-employee Merrill Wealth Management unit, Hans boosted year-over-year revenue by 9% in 2024 and increased the AUM balance of the Investment Advisory Program by 18% year-over-year, among other accomplishments.

The unit's success has continued into 2025. During the first half of this year, Merrill Wealth Management posted nearly $10 billion in revenue, and wealth management advisors added 12,700 clients and more than 20,000 households. As of March 31, Hans and Schrimpf oversaw client balances of $3.5 trillion.

Read more about Hans' performance.

Anu Aiyengar, J. P. Morgan

Global Head of Advisory and M&A

Anu Aiyengar can measure the change in her role over the last year by the miles she has traveled.

As global head of advisory and M&A for J.P. Morgan, Aiyengar circled the planet in May. Her journey, which included a mix of internal and external meetings and conferences, began in southern California and touched down in London, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Sydney and Melbourne. At every stop, she met with employees in town halls, small groups and one-on-ones.

Aiyengar has been global head of M&A at J.P. Morgan since 2023, and she still spends time advising clients on deals. But her role expanded in 2024 as part of an internal merger of the bank's investment, corporate and commercial banks. She is one of four investment banking executives on the combined bank's executive and operating committee, which also has representatives from the other business lines.

Learn more about Aiyengar's role.

Anna Marrs, American Express

Group President, Global Merchant Network Services

Banks and payment companies have been fighting to capture small business banking customers, and for American Express' Group President of Global Merchant Network Services

Anna Marrs, much of last year was spent working on that goal.

2024 was a year marked with economic and political uncertainty, and that provided Amex an opportunity to more deeply engage with its small business clients, said Marrs, who until earlier this year was Group President of Amex's Global Commercial Services and Credit & Fraud Risk (Marrs was ranked on her 2024 title for this year's list.) Her division is the company's second largest business by revenue and card member spending, and accounted for approximately 25% of American Express's total revenue in 2023.

Learn more about Marrs' leadership.

Emily Portney, BNY

Global Head of Asset Servicing

As global head of BNY's asset-servicing business, Emily Portney understands that balancing rapid innovation and integrating acquisitions seamlessly are both critical to driving her unit's strategic growth and consistent financial performance.

She's at the right place to shape and drive innovation. BNY, already the custodian for several major stablecoin issuers, including Circle and Ripple, is positioning itself to be at the center of the unfolding world of on-chain finance. Portney sees many potential avenues of growth on this front, including making ETFs available in wallets, tokenization to improve financing transactions, and perhaps even using tokenized mutual funds to finance initial and variation margin requirements. "I think we're going to play a very important part in that ecosystem," she said.

Read more about Portney's plans.

Donna Milrod, State Street Corporation

Executive Vice President and Chief Product Officer

For the fifth consecutive year, Donna Milrod, executive vice chair and chief product officer of Boston-based State Street Corporation, is a Most Powerful Women in Finance honoree.

At State Street, Milrod is responsible for leading the product development strategy, value propositions, and growth of the Investment servicing business. She leads a team of 600 and has eight direct reports. Additionally, she serves on the executive committee and reports to Joerg Ambrosius, State Street's head of investment services.

Milrod is also responsible for leading strategy, value propositions and growth of the company's asset servicing business, which represents more than 80 % of State Street's overall business.

Learn more about Milrod's leadership.

Michal Katz, Mizuho Americas

Head of Investment and Corporate Banking

Michal Katz has an ambitious growth strategy to make Mizuho Americas, a division of Tokyo-based Mizuho Financial Group, a key player in investment and corporate banking in the U.S.

In 2023, Katz spearheaded a $550 million acquisition of Greenhill, a boutique investment bank specializing in M&A and restructuring. The purchase brought 370 bankers under Katz's remit and at least $300 million in annual revenue. Katz continues to build out her team with strategic hires and internal promotions.

"While success is hardly ever linear, I'm proud to say that the acquisition has been a 'win win,'" Katz said. "Greenhill clients now have access to Mizuho's robust balance sheet, lending and capital markets capabilities, while Mizuho clients benefit from world class advisory capabilities."

Read more about Katz's work.

Lynn Martin, NYSE Group

President

When markets swooned in April, NYSE Group President Lynn Martin was ready. Years of investment in cutting-edge technologies and processes had prepared the world's largest exchange to weather the volatility and surging trading volumes wrought by tariff concerns.

In a CNBC op-ed, she reassured investors that the "beating heart of the global financial system" had met the challenge, handling more than 1 trillion messages on two separate days with a median processing time of 30 microseconds.

"I felt it was my responsibility to remind people that the NYSE has been around 233 years. We've survived wars, pandemics and geopolitical uncertainty, so don't panic," she explained now. "We're quite proud that our financial markets showed their resilience and strength during that time."

Read more about Martin's role at NYSE.

Racquel Oden, HSBC

U.S. Head of International Wealth and Premier Banking and U.S. Head of Global Private Banking

Racquel Oden's role spans two of HSBC's most strategically important businesses: she serves as U.S. head of international wealth and premier banking and U.S. head of global private banking.

Since joining HSBC in 2023, Oden has been instrumental in driving the bank's strategy to expand its wealth business in the U.S., which is a key growth market within the bank's global portfolio.

Achieving these goals at a tumultuous time for markets and geopolitics brings its own set of challenges, as HSBC's wealth and private banking serves 20 million clients worldwide.

"With a client base that is globally minded, my biggest challenge today is ensuring that we are providing the same world-class advice that our clients have come to expect in a world that is constantly changing and evolving," Oden said. "The news headlines have moved so rapidly this year, it's our responsibility as wealth advisors to anticipate what's around the corner and deliver tailored advice in a personal way — all at once."

Meghan Graper, Barclays

Managing Director, Global Head of Debt Capital Markets

After starting as a summer intern at Barclays, Meghan Graper spent more than two decades steadily rising through the ranks to become global head—and, at the end of 2024, sole global head—of debt capital markets. Given the DCM group's standout results on her watch, her promotion was hardly a surprise.

Under her leadership, Barclays' DCM business grew revenues 8% year-over-year in 2024—following a record 2023—the largest year-over-year move for Barclays since before the pandemic. Her group's full-year 2024 revenue hit $554 million, and 2025 is on pace to exceed that mark. Through the first half of this year, revenue totaled $413 million. She has 20 direct reports, and 173 people on her team. (Graper is ranked based on the co-head role she held prior to her promotion in late 2024, as per American Banker's methodology requiring a woman to be in her position for at least one full year.)

Learn more about Graper's career.

Martina Cheung, S&P Global

President and CEO

Acquisitions can change the essential shape, dynamics and performance of any company. No one knows this better than Martina Cheung. Appointed as president and CEO of S&P Global in November 2024, Cheung's experience with the global firm began in 2010. Prior to moving into her current role, she was president of S&P's Global Ratings business. (American Banker's methodology requires that a woman be in her role for at least one year, so Cheung is ranked based on her performance leading S&P Global Ratings, not her current position as CEO of S&P Global.) To her, one of the defining moments of that journey was leading the due diligence for S&P Global's $44-billion acquisition of rival IHS Markit in 2020.

Now 15 years in at S&P, she helms a company worth about $150 billion. Even more significant are the levers S&P can move with its pronouncements on the creditworthiness of the world's leading companies and governments. In such an environment, the impact of acquisitions takes on even greater weight. S&P has executed some high-profile acquisitions during 2024 and in the beginning of 2025, including Visible Alpha, World Hydrogen, Proton LP. Clearly M&A activity will continue to drive growth and transformation for S&P.

Read more about Cheung's role.

Kate El-Hillow, Russell Investments

President and Chief Investment Officer

For four decades, Russell Investments has reached individual investors through financial advisers, retirement plans and other go-betweens. But this year, the firm launched a suite of actively managed ETFs designed to be accessed directly by consumers.

"We view this as a pivotal moment for the firm," said Kate El-Hillow, Russell's president and chief investment officer, noting that the move opened new channels for growth. "It's not just about a new product line. It's a strategic shift that expands our relevance across a wider client spectrum."

The launch coincided with Russell's 40th anniversary of providing products for retail investors. The Seattle-based company, which manages assets of about $355 billion, attracted net investor inflows of $24 billion in 2024, the firm's strongest growth in more than a decade, according to El-Hillow. Revenue grew by double digits.

Learn more about El-Hillow's leadership.

Ann Fogarty, State Street

Head of Global Delivery and COO of Investment Services

As businesses increasingly employ artificial intelligence (AI), Ann Fogarty is studying agentic AI through a Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) course, to learn how to write prompts and otherwise optimize its use.

"I want to really understand the opportunities there," she said.

Fogarty leads the global delivery of State Street's investment services, the firm's largest business unit. In July 2025, she was appointed chief operating officer of investment services, with a remit to align expertise from across BNY to address challenges and develop solutions. (American Banker's methodology requires that a woman be in her role for at least one year, so Fogarty is ranked based on her performance as head of global delivery, not her current position as COO of investment services.)

Read more about Fogarty's career.

Kourtney Gibson, TIAA

CEO, Retirement Solutions

Just six months after Kourtney Gibson was promoted from chief institutional officer to CEO of TIAA Retirement Solutions, global stock markets crashed in response to jitters over U.S. trade tariffs. For Gibson and the nearly 900-employee retirement solutions business, the market volatility represented a pressing challenge.

"During April 2025's significant market disruption, our clients faced tremendous uncertainty with regards to their retirement plans," said Gibson, who became CEO last October. "It was essential our teams remained calm and confident, particularly while call volumes spiked, and were agile enough to pivot with our clients' changing needs." (Gibson was ranked on her 2024 title of Chief Institutional Client Officer.)

Amid the market turbulence, TIAA clients poured money into the company's flagship fixed annuity, TIAA Traditional. This, according to Gibson, demonstrated investors' growing interest in guaranteed asset classes as part of a diversified portfolio.

Read more about Gibson's role at TIAA.

Solita Marcelli, UBS

Global Head of Investment Management, UBS Global Wealth Management

Solita Marcelli has come a long way from her entry-level role in equity research.

As of July, she is global head of investment management for UBS Global Wealth Management, a step up from her previous role as chief investment officer Americas. (She was ranked according to her 2024 title, Chief Investment Officer, Americas, UBS Global.) But just like she did as a researcher, she finds herself waking up in the middle of the night to jot down ideas.

"What I've learned about myself is that I still have that same spark and curiosity as I did starting a new role as I did 25 years ago," she said. "Losing a little sleep is a small price to pay for loving what I do and feeling energized every day."

Of course, there's a difference between landing a first job in research and earning an executive promotion overseeing more than $2 trillion in assets under management.

Sharon Yeshaya, Morgan Stanley

EVP, Chief Financial Officer

After a summer internship in 2000 at Morgan Stanley, Sharon Yeshaya joined the financial services giant as an investment banking analyst the following year. Since then, she's climbed the corporate ranks in eight different roles. She's held her current position — executive vice president and chief financial officer — since 2021.

Her career trajectory, however, hasn't been a smooth climb. As a female executive and the daughter of immigrant parents, Yeshaya openly acknowledges the challenges she has faced. But rather than let those challenges knock her down, she embraces them as "opportunities to grow." These challenges "teach me to ground myself in preparation, remain focused on the long term, and make decisions with intention," said Yeshaya.

It's that preparation, long-term focus and intentional decision-making that have helped her gain a seat in the C-suite at the $7.9 trillion-asset Morgan Stanley. Today, she sits on the firm's operating and management committees.

Jenny Johnson, Franklin Templeton

President and CEO

Jenny Johnson believes Franklin Templeton has unlocked the key to bringing investments in private markets to more clients, a trend that is likely to accelerate under Trump administration policies designed to broaden access to private equity, real estate and other less liquid investment options. The key is something the firm has been doing for three decades—educating financial advisers.

Advisers want to give their clients more options, said Johnson, president and CEO of Franklin Templeton, which manages about $1.6 trillion in assets. "There's a real recognition that it's kind of un-American if we don't all have fair access to the same kinds of investments."

But it is not enough to pick a good product, she said. "If the firm behind that product hasn't surrounded it with really robust education, it's too hard for the advisers to understand."

Learn more about Johnson's leadership.

Christina Minnis, Goldman Sachs

Global Head of Credit & Asset Finance and head of Global Acquisition Finance, Capital Solutions Group

Christina Minnis is addressing one of the most important trends taking place in finance today: the emergence and growth of private credit as a powerful tool for clients.

Earlier this year, Christina Minnis was named the first Global Head of Credit & Asset Finance and head of Global Acquisition Finance within the newly created Capital Solutions Group at Goldman Sachs. Her unit is responsible for a significant portion of the new group's business. "I'm most proud of having been asked to lead that effort, working with many of my partners to execute the mission that David [Solomon, CEO] and John [Waldron, president and COO] laid out," she said.

"That mission is to bring together the best structuring capabilities of the firm with the best distribution capabilities in order to create global, very bespoke solutions to our clients on the issuing side. And, on the investing side, to continue to have a very strong relationship and sourcing engine for our asset and wealth management division, " she explained.

Learn more about Minnis' role.

Meghan Shue, Wilmington Trust

Chief Investment Strategist, EVP

Meghan Shue spends a lot of time analyzing the big-picture events and broad data points that influence the investment portfolios of her clients at Wilmington Trust, the wealth management arm of M&T Bank.

But Shue also values hearing directly from those clients. They help her gain a more granular view of economic trends.

"We will sometimes see at the macro level that labor market data looks okay," Shue said. "And then you speak to enough business owners or individuals, and you might get a little bit more color that, underneath the surface, it's actually a little bit softer, which is our current view."

Given the volatility in the market, Shue is spending even more time on the road presenting to and speaking with clients. "When things are great, nobody really needs to hear from me. I hope they want to hear from me, but they don't really need to," she said. "But when things are uncertain or the market is volatile, that's when we really have to be out in full force."

Learn more about Shue's career.