A careless gesture towards one of the strongest brands in the world by the most popular football player of recent years was valued at several billion dollars.
The incident occurred in Budapest, at one of the press conferences as part of the Euro 2020 European Football Championship taking place these days. Cristiano Ronaldo, who was invited to communicate with journalists, went to the press and called for the use of pure mineral water instead of Coca-Cola. Bottles with prepared soda from the manufacturer's official partner of the championship were defiantly put aside by the footballer.
Cristiano's call to "drink clean water" cost the corporation several billion
According to the portal The Atchletic, the company could lose about $ 4 billion due to the actions of a football player. Shares of Coca-Cola fell 1.6% that day, from $56.18 to $55.24 per share. The capitalization of the manufacturer has thus decreased from 242 to 238 billion dollars.
Coca-Cola traditionally acts as a sponsor of all major international football forums and is an official partner of UEFA, under whose auspices the European Championship is held. Cristiano himself, unlike other world football stars, does not advertise the products of the Coca-Cola Company or PepsiCo, although you can still find Ronaldo's campaign for Coca-Cola of the early 2000s on the net.
In 2019, Forbes estimated the income of the Portuguese at $79.6 million, $27 million of which was brought to him by contracts with global brands - Nike, Armani, KFC, Emirates, etc. In 2020, Ronaldo earned $105 million and became the first ever football player whose revenues exceeded $1 billion. In the match against the Hungarian national team in Euro 2020, the footballer scored twice, becoming the most scoring player in the history of all European championships.