Coca-Cola may be the best defensive stock on the planet, with the simplest business model and a brand known everywhere from New York City to tiny villages in Asia. x.com
Techquity
Technology Investor, Fundamental Research
Coca-Cola is the ultimate safe haven, a holding that stabilizes and protects a portfolio. Since 2008 the best spot to add has been at or under the 200-week moving average; the test of that level at $60 in November 2024 signaled value with a margin of safety. Shares have since reached $84, a 39% climb in 20 months, plus a 2.5% dividend. x.com
Coca-Cola is one of the best businesses ever built and will very likely still deliver investment results 50 years from now. It is far more than sugar water: it owns 500+ brands, including Dasani and Smartwater, and 32 billion-dollar brands. x.com
Coca-Cola's retained earnings do little for shareholders when management does not distribute much of the growth. At 27 times earnings, a 2.3% yield with no expected large dividend hikes, special dividend or meaningful buybacks makes look-through earnings a poor basis for the price: EPS rose about $1 in five years while dividends rose only 52 cents. x.com x.com x.com x.com
Berkshire Hathaway benefits from a flight to low-beta quality stocks that are not burdening themselves with AI debt. Its shares are up 10% in October, while three of its largest holdings, Apple, Coca-Cola and Chevron, have been surging. Boring pays. x.com
Qualcomm, Johnson & Johnson, Wendy's, IBM, Coca-Cola, PepsiCo and Caterpillar are steady dividend payers that pay investors to wait, in keeping with Warren Buffett's rule never to lose money. Johnson & Johnson, Coca-Cola and PepsiCo have raised their dividends for decades. Qualcomm licenses wireless patents nearly every phone maker pays for, IBM leads in quantum computing research, and Caterpillar is a growing supplier of power generation for data centers. x.com x.com x.com x.com x.com x.com … Show more
Coca-Cola's valuation is no longer compelling despite strong operational execution. Shares trade at about 26.7 times earnings versus a historical average of 22.3, so much of the near-term optimism is priced in. Continued earnings growth can support the premium, but the margin of safety is considerably smaller. x.com
Coca-Cola's business is healthy, but its headline quarter overstates it, so the stance is bullish-neutral. Global volume rose 5%, free cash flow hit $6.9B year to date, and the dividend is covered at about 72% of free cash flow. But EPS grew 16% while currency-neutral comparable EPS grew 9%, underlying margin expansion was 24bp rather than about 90, and Asia Pacific price/mix fell 9% to defend shelf space. The raised 9-10% EPS growth guide includes about 3 points of currency tailwind. x.com
Consumer staples such as Costco, Walmart, Procter & Gamble, Kroger, General Mills, Coca-Cola and PepsiCo are among the names to study if hantavirus fear dominates the next 60-90 days, whether or not a lockdown happens. Markets react to perception before confirmed reality, and fear alone shifts attention, behavior and capital flows. A real pandemic is not needed; the fear narrative only has to persist long enough for capital and behavior to start shifting. x.com
Coca-Cola's $20 billion-plus tax liability under litigation is significant for a low-margin business; a billion-dollar tax penalty helped sink VF Corp. The stock has lagged the S&P 500 even from the best entries of the past 15 years, having run out of growth since globalization peaked, and its 2.67% dividend is weak against safe, growing alternatives. Spinning off and reacquiring bottlers has handed the alpha to others. x.com
Consumer staples should strongly outperform in 2026, one of the year's expected surprises, if the AI bubble bursts. In that scenario circular financing deals unwind, AI capex slows abruptly on return-on-investment worries and power bottlenecks, and depreciation and weaker demand wreck AI earnings estimates. PepsiCo, Coca-Cola, Procter & Gamble and Kimberly-Clark would then materially outperform the Magnificent 7, with PepsiCo beating most staples on better organic unit growth. x.com