There’s some athletes and celebrities that think they have juice, and can move the needle with their words and actions. There are influencers who make a few grand for posting about a particular brand for their legion of followers.  

And then there’s Cristiano Ronaldo. 

With one small movement of his hand, the world-wide soccer phenom single-handedly wiped $4 billion off of Coca-Cola’s market cap.  One move, that took a couple seconds, dropped an iconic brand’s stock price 1.6%.

Here’s how it all went down. 

Ronaldo is the captain of the Portugal national team, and his squad was playing in Budapest Monday in their Group F Opener at the Euro 2020. 

Prior to their game with Hungary, Ronaldo appeared at a press conference to speak to the media about the matchup.  When he sat down, there were two glass bottles of Coca Cola on the table he was sitting at. Why? Well, because Coca-Cola is an official sponsor of Euro 2020 that spends millions on the event.  

Ronaldo is a well-known advocate of a healthy diet and doesn’t play around when it comes to putting things in his body he feels are less than optimal, so when he saw the Coca-Cola, he slid both the bottles away to the side,  out of the cameras view, and instead held up a bottle of water, looked into the camera and said in Portuguese the word water: “Agua.”

Boom.  That’s all it took.  By Tuesday the stock price fell to $55.22 and Coke’s market value dropped from $242bn to $238bn.

Can you say “awkward moment” for tournament officials.  They were in the sticky situation of walking a fine line of not ticking off either their top sponsor or the world’s biggest soccer star. 

Coca-Cola released a statement after getting dissed by Ronaldo saying this: “Everyone is entitled to their drink preferences.” 

Coca-Cola has been a partner of UEFA for 33 years.  I’m sure the tourney is praying there will be a 34th. 

Oh, by the way, Ronaldo scored two goals Tuesday as Portugal won their match 3-0.

Case closed on who is the most influential athlete in the world right now. 

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