MIAMI--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct 6, 2025--
Merco, a leading corporate reputation monitor with a 25-year track record, today announced the first edition of Merco Companies and Business Leaders Rankings in the sunshine state. Merco’s multi-stakeholder evaluation methodology is also the only KPMG-verified corporate reputation assessment in the world.
This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20251006180142/en/
Top 100 companies with the best reputation
The Merco Companies 2025 ranking revealed the following companies as the top 10 in Florida (ranked from first to tenth): Publix, The Walt Disney Company, Google, Apple, Costco, Amazon, Microsoft Corporation, Chewy, Toyota and Aldi.
Taking a broader view of the ranking, retail is the best evaluated sector in Florida, with Chewy, The Home Depot, Target and Walmart also joining the top 30 most reputable companies (eight in total from the sector).
Florida’s evolution as a top tech hub in the past decade also shines in the results of the top 100 companies with the best reputation. Tech giants IBM, Cisco and Meta are also ranked, along with Florida-headquartered companies including: Tech Data, Citrix, UKG, Roper Technologies, Reliaquest, and TD Synnex.
Additionally, top national players from the financial sector, including American Express, Raymond James, Inc., J.P.Morgan Chase & Co., Capital One and Bank of America, hold strong positions in the top 30.
Top 50 most influential leaders
In terms of the 2025 most influential Business Leaders in the state, nationally recognized leaders join Florida-based business elites in the top 50. The 10 leaders with the best reputation are the following (ranked from first to tenth): Kevin Murphy (Publix), Bob Iger (The Walt Disney Company), Tim Cook (Apple), Bill Gates (Microsoft Corporation), Todd Jones (Publix), Jeff Bezos (Amazon), Elon Musk (Tesla), John Morgan (Morgan & Morgan, P.A.), Jorge Pérez (Related Group), and Jorge González (City National Bank).
“Driving reputation means building trust with different stakeholders to boost business growth,” said Jose Maria San Segundo, CEO, Merco. “American business leaders understand this well, as it is in the U.S. where the very concept of corporate reputation was developed.”
Merco’s rigorous methodology
See the full rankings here.
Publix, Disney, Google, Apple and Costco, Florida’s Most Reputable Companies per Merco
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Semiofficial news agencies in Iran published a chart Thursday suggesting the country’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard put sea mines into the Strait of Hormuz during the war, in a message that may be intended to pressure the U.S. as uncertainty hangs over a days-old two-week ceasefire and further negotiations are set to begin in Pakistan.
The charts were released by the ISNA news agency, as well as Tasnim, which is believed to be close to the Guard, and showed a large circle marked “danger zone” in Farsi over the Traffic Separation Scheme, which was the route ships used to take through the strait, the narrow mouth of the Persian Gulf through which 20% of all oil and natural gas traded once passed.
The chart suggested ships travel further north through waters closer to Iran’s mainland near Larak Island, a route that some ships were observed taking during the war.
The charts were dated from Feb. 28 until Thursday, April 9, and it was unclear if the Guard had cleared any mining on the route since then.
U.S. President Donald Trump posted a statement insisting that his surge of warships and troops will remain around Iran “until such time as the REAL AGREEMENT reached is fully complied with.”
Trump’s comments on his Truth Social platform appeared to be a way to pressure Iran.
“If for any reason it is not, which is highly unlikely, then the ‘Shootin’ Starts,’ bigger, and better, and stronger than anyone has ever seen before,” Trump wrote.
He also insisted Iran would not be able to build nuclear weapons and “the Strait of Hormuz WILL BE OPEN & SAFE.”
The U.S. and Iran both claimed victory after reaching the ceasefire agreement, and world leaders expressed relief. But more drones and missiles hit Iran and Gulf Arab countries after the deal was announced.
At the same time, Israel intensified its attacks on the Hezbollah militant group in Lebanon, hitting commercial and residential areas in Beirut. At least 182 people were killed Wednesday in the deadliest day of fighting there.
The violence threatened to scuttle what U.S. Vice President JD Vance called a “fragile” deal.
Iran's parliament speaker said Wednesday that planned talks were “unreasonable” because Washington had broken three of Tehran’s 10 conditions for an end to the fighting. In a social media post, Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf objected to Israeli attacks on Hezbollah, an alleged drone incursion into Iranian airspace after the ceasefire took effect and U.S. refusal to accept any Iranian enrichment capabilities in a final agreement.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi insisted that an end to the war in Lebanon was part of the ceasefire deal, but Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Trump said the truce did not cover Lebanon. When the deal was announced, the prime minister of Pakistan, which served as a mediator, said in a social media post that it applied to “everywhere including Lebanon and elsewhere.”
A New York-based think tank warned the ceasefire “hovers on the verge of collapse.”
The Soufan Center said Israel's strikes on Lebanon on Wednesday added to the risk the deal would fall apart.
“Even if Lebanon was formally outside the deal, the scale of Israel’s strikes was likely to be viewed as escalatory, nonetheless,” it wrote in an analysis published Thursday. “Israel’s strikes can be understood both as an effort to drive a wedge between Iran and its proxies and as a response to being allegedly sidelined in the original ceasefire discussions.”
Becatoros reported from Athens, Greece.
A rescue worker extinguishes burning cars at the site of an Israeli airstrike in central Beirut, Lebanon, Wednesday, April 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
Smoke rises following several Israeli airstrikes in Beirut, Lebanon, Wednesday, April 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Hassan Ammar)
Ali, 4, holds a toy horse next to the tent his family uses as a shelter after fleeing Israeli bombardment in southern Lebanon, in Beirut, Lebanon, Wednesday, April 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)
Government supporters gather ahead of the funeral procession for Maj. Gen. Majid Khademi, head of intelligence for Iran's paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, in Tehran, Iran, Wednesday, April 8, 2026. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)
FILE - Two police officers walk in front of an anti-U.S. billboard depicting American aircraft being caught by Iranian armed forces in a fishing net beneath the words in Farsi, "The Strait of Hormuz will remain closed, The entire Persian Gulf is our hunting ground," in Tehran, Iran, Sunday, April 5, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi, File)
