Beverage giant Coca-Cola has lost billions in market value due to a simple gesture by one of the world’s most expensive footballers, Cristiano Ronaldo, during a pre-match press conference in the ongoing Euro championship.
Ronaldo, who’s leading Portugal in the ongoing Euro competition, had arrived to speak to the media ahead of his team’s match against Hungary on Tuesday when he found a couple of Coca-Cola bottles placed on the table. The Juventus star removed the bottles away from the camera in disgust and lifted a water bottle to advise people to drink water.
The video of Ronaldo snubbing Coca-Cola, one of the official sponsorers of Euro 2020, went viral across the globe. The development adversely impacted the market value of Coca-Cola as the beverage giant’s share price dropped from $56.10 to $55.22, a 1.6% drop. A report by London’s Guardian website said that the market value of Coca-Cola went down from $242bn to $238bn – a drop of $4bn.
Football star @Cristiano Ronaldo removed two bottles of tournament sponsors Coca-Cola as he entered a #Euro2020 news conference before encouraging people to drink water.
Watch more videos from Sky News: https://t.co/gQ5Raqks0q pic.twitter.com/XiKgBrgjw0
— Sky News (@SkyNews) June 16, 2021
A spokesperson for Euro 2020 was quoted as saying, “Players are offered water, alongside Coca-Cola and Coca-Cola Zero Sugar, on arrival at our press conferences.” The spokesperson added that everyone was ‘entitled to their drink preferences.’
Ronaldo was the star of the match against Hungary as he scored twice in Hungary’s 3-0 defeat against Portugal at the group stage. He first scored by successfully converting the penalty before score his second in the dying hours of the match.
Ronaldo snubs Pepsi to protest against Israel?
In 2018, Ronaldo was in the news after several news articles claimed that the star footballer had turned down a multi-million dollar deal by Pepsi to express his solidarity with Palestinians.
However, a fact-check by Janta Ka Reported had found the claims to be fake.