Forbes on the 147 companies controlling everything

By Rob Neill

Occupy this: Bruce Upbin over at our partner Forbes reports on a Swiss university study that built a model of basically the global structure of economic power or, as as Upbin puts it “who owns what.”

Aside from the Laserium-quality pretty picture that is the resulting model, they came up with what are the 147 companies that are most connected and therefore have the largest amount of control in global finance.

Says Upbin:

The #occupy movement will eat this up as evidence for massive redistribution of wealth. The New Scientist talked to one systems theorist who is “disconcerted” at the level of interconnectedness, but not surprised. Such structures occur commonly in biology, things like fungus, lichen and weeds. Economists say the danger comes when you combine hyperconnection with the concentration of power.

Here are the top 10 on the list:

1. Barclays plc
2. Capital Group Companies Inc
3. FMR Corporation
4. AXA
5. State Street Corporation
6. JP Morgan Chase & Co
7. Legal & General Group plc
8. Vanguard Group Inc
9. UBS AG
10. Merrill Lynch & Co Inc

See more at Forbes.