Francesco Curto & team, Deutsche Bank

Leaping from runner-up to third place is Deutsche Bank’s six-member squad under Francesco Curto. Investors laud the firm’s proprietary cash-return-on-capital-invested valuation tool — which allows for comparisons across sectors and markets without sector and country biases — as “reasonable and insightful,” as one client puts it. This year the accounting team, whose members are based in London, New York and Paris, will continue to focus on sustainable cash returns, free cash flow and supportable dividends as the keys to maximizing equity returns. “There is still too much emphasis on price-earnings and P/E relatives in the world, and all too often companies on low P/Es have terrible cash-conversion rates,” Curto explains. “The market knows it, but many keep using these meaningless measures — and that is just lazy.”