Soccer star Ronaldo rejects Coca-Cola in public, company’s market value crashes by $4 bn

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Cristiano Ronaldo’s pushed aside two Coca-Cola bottles during a press conference at the European football championship to exhibit his strong dislike for sugary drinks, an incident that went viral on social media. Soon after this, a whopping $4bn was wiped off the market value of the global cola giant as its share price crashed.</p>
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The Portugal captain, a renowned health enthusiast, made it clear what he thinks of the carbonated soft drink. Within seconds of sitting down, the footballer shifted the bottles of Coca-Cola away from him during a press conference in Budapest on Monday in the prelude to his country’s Group F game against Hungary.</p>
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Ronaldo followed it by holding up a bottle of water before declaring in Portuguese: “Agua!” (water), appearing to encourage people to prefer that to Coca-Cola. The video of the whole episode was shared widely on social media. </p>
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The incident came as a major setback to Coca-Cola which is one of the official sponsors of Euro 2020 . The company’s stock price dropped from $56.10 to $55.22 per share almost immediately after Ronaldo’s gesture, a 1.6% decline. The total market value of Coca-Cola crashed by $4 billion from $242 bn to $238 bn, according to a report in the Guardian newspaper.</p>
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A Euros spokesperson said: “Players are offered water, alongside Coca-Cola and Coca-Cola Zero Sugar, on arrival at our press conferences.” Everyone “is entitled to their drink preferences”.</p>
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The international superstar has a staggering 300 million Instagram followers which made the news spread like wildfire.</p>
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On Tuesday, he scored twice in Portugal’3-0 win over Hungary surpassing France great Michel Platini as the record goal scorer at the European Championship finals with 11 goals.</p>
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<strong>Video Link: </strong><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/football/2021/jun/16/cristiano-ronaldo-snubs-coca-cola-billions-wiped-off-drink-giants-market-value">Cristiano Ronaldo snub wipes billions off Coca-Cola’s market value</a></p>