Each year, Forbes magazine releases its ranking of the world’s most powerful people—and it just can’t get enough of Vladimir Putin. The Russian president has topped Forbes’ list for the third year in a row.
How do the editors decide this? To compile the list of 73 people, Forbes measures potential candidates power on four factors: their power over others, the financial resources they control, whether the candidate is powerful in multiple spheres, and if the candidate actively used their power.
For Putin, Forbes said he ”continues to prove he’s one of the few men in the world powerful enough to do what he wants—and get away with it.”
German chancellor Angela Merkel came in second, moving up three spots from last year. (She’s still the world’s most powerful woman.) Barack Obama dropped to third— the first time a sitting US president has not made the top two spots on the list—though the list has only been around for seven years. Pope Francis and Chinese president Xi Jinping rounded off the top five.
There were eight newcomers on the list, including Saudi Arabia’s King Salman, who replaced his brother; newly-elected Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau; and Dell CEO Michael Dell, who helped acquire EMC for $67 billion in the largest-ever deal between technology companies.
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and North Korea’s supreme leader Kim Jong-un are the youngest on Forbes’ list— aged 31 and 32, respectively.
US Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton made a comeback this year, at 58th; she was last listed in 2011. Donald Trump ranked second to last.