Is Coca-Cola Stock (KO) a Buy Now? Latest News, Price Targets and Dividend Outlook

As of the close on Friday, December 5, 2025, Coca-Cola stock (NYSE: KO) is trading around $70 per share, valuing the company at just over $300 billion. The shares sit roughly 6% below their 52‑week high of $74.38, and the stock offers an annual dividend of $2.04 per share, implying a forward yield of about 2.9%. ^[1]

This article rounds up the latest news, Wall Street forecasts and fresh analysis on Coca-Cola stock as of December 7, 2025, to help investors understand how KO looks heading into 2026.

Coca-Cola stock today: price, performance and volatility

Recent data from multiple sources show Coca-Cola’s stock price holding near $70, with a market capitalization around $300–303 billion and a 52‑week trading range of $60.62 to $74.38. ^[2]

Despite its reputation as a “steady” defensive name, KO has quietly delivered double‑digit gains in 2025:

A recent Benzinga forecast notes that Coca-Cola has returned about 17% year to date and roughly 13% over the past 12 months. ^[3]
Simply Wall St highlights a year‑to‑date share price return of 13.2% and a one‑year total shareholder return of 15.3%, even after a modest pullback in the last week. ^[4]
24/7 Wall St adds that KO gained just over 4% in October and another 4% in November, putting year‑to‑date gains near 18% by late November 2025. ^[5]

Volatility remains low. Dividend.com and MarketBeat both put Coca-Cola’s beta near 0.4, underscoring its role as a low‑volatility “defensive” holding within the S&P 500. ^[6]

Fresh December 7 updates: hedge funds move, insiders trim

Hedge funds reshuffle positions in KO

Two MarketBeat reports dated December 7, 2025 show that institutional investors are actively adjusting their stakes in Coca‑Cola: ^[7]

Dnca Finance reduced its position in KO by 20.6% in Q2, selling 32,482 shares and ending the quarter with 125,000 shares valued at about $8.84 million.
Bollard Group LLC, by contrast, increased its KO position by 8.8%, adding 22,420 shares to reach 276,081 shares worth roughly $19.53 million.

Both reports note that roughly 70% of Coca-Cola’s shares are held by institutions and hedge funds, reflecting the brand’s entrenched status in large, income‑oriented portfolios. ^[8]

Insider selling but still modest ownership

The same filings highlight recent insider selling:

EVP Manuel Arroyo sold 139,689 shares at an average price near $70.80, for proceeds just under $9.9 million.
EVP Nancy Quan sold 31,625 shares at about $71.17, for roughly $2.25 million. ^[9]

Across the last 90 days, insiders have sold roughly 225,000 shares worth about $16 million, with insiders collectively holding under 1% of the stock. ^[10]

This pattern is consistent with routine executive diversification rather than a wholesale exit, but investors who watch insider transactions will note that the recent flow is clearly on the selling side.

Strategic moves: refranchising, Africa deal and board shake-up

Coca-Cola has also been active on the strategic and corporate structure front in late 2025.

Exit from key bottling stake

On November 7, 2025, Coca-Cola Consolidated (NASDAQ: COKE) announced it had repurchased all 18.8 million of its common shares held by a Coca‑Cola subsidiary at $127 per share, for a total of about $2.4 billion. Coca‑Cola relinquished its board seat at COKE as part of the transaction. ^[11]

This move fits Coca‑Cola’s long‑running strategy of refranchising bottling operations and focusing capital on higher‑margin concentrate and brands instead of capital‑intensive bottling assets.

Separately, Coca‑Cola and Gutsche Family Investments reached an agreement to sell a 75% controlling interest in Coca‑Cola Beverages Africa (CCBA) to Coca‑Cola HBC AG, valuing CCBA at about $3.4 billion. After closing, Coca‑Cola HBC is expected to handle roughly two‑thirds of Africa’s Coca‑Cola system volume and more than half of the continent’s population, while Coca‑Cola expects bottling investments to fall to around 5% of consolidated net revenue. ^[12]

For shareholders, these transactions reinforce the company’s asset‑light, high‑margin strategy, even if they also modestly reduce direct exposure to certain bottling profits.

New tech-focused director

On October 16, 2025, Coca‑Cola announced that Max Levchin—co‑founder of PayPal and founder of Affirm—joined the board of directors. In the same release, the company reaffirmed its quarterly dividend of $0.51 per share, payable December 15, 2025 to shareholders of record on December 1. ^[13]

Levchin’s background in fintech, data and consumer platforms dovetails with Coca‑Cola’s increasing emphasis on digital marketing, AI‑driven analytics and direct‑to‑consumer channels, themes that recent analyst pieces have highlighted as a growing pillar of the investment case. ^[14]

Brand and licensing updates

Coca‑Cola has kept its marketing engine busy in the second half of 2025: ^[15]

A “Coca‑Cola x Star Wars: Refresh Your Galaxy” campaign launched in Europe in September 2025, with 21 limited‑edition cans and bottles and augmented‑reality experiences tied to the Star Wars franchise.
Fanta announced a global Halloween partnership with Universal Pictures and Blumhouse, featuring themed flavors linked to horror icons like Chucky and Michael Myers.
A collaboration with Jack in the Box brought back the limited‑edition Coca‑Cola Starlight beverage in a special combo meal.

These campaigns reinforce Coca‑Cola’s ability to monetize intellectual property partnerships and keep core brands culturally visible, even in saturated markets.

Earnings and margins: Q3 2025 still shows pricing power

Coca‑Cola reported third‑quarter 2025 results on October 21, 2025, and numbers were broadly ahead of expectations: ^[16]

Net revenues rose 5% to $12.5 billion, while organic revenue (excluding currency and structural items) grew 6%.
Global unit case volume increased 1%, meaning growth was driven primarily by pricing and mix rather than pure volume.
Operating margin reached 32.0%, up sharply from 21.2% in the prior‑year quarter, while comparable operating margin expanded to 31.9% from 30.7%.
Reported EPS grew 30% to $0.86, and comparable EPS rose 6% to $0.82, outpacing analyst estimates of $0.78 per share.

A follow‑up analysis from Zacks, syndicated via Nasdaq and Finviz, emphasized that while the comparable gross margin dipped about 10 basis points year over year, the comparable operating margin expanded by roughly 120 basis points, thanks to tighter cost control, more efficient media spending and improved supply‑chain management. ^[17]

In other words, Coca‑Cola is still successfully pushing price/mix while protecting (and even expanding) margins—an attractive combination in an environment where many consumer companies are seeing either volume pressure or margin squeeze.

Dividends: a 60+ year streak and nearly 3% yield

For income‑oriented investors, Coca‑Cola’s dividend profile remains central to the KO story.

The company currently pays a quarterly dividend of $0.51 per share, or $2.04 on an annualized basis, implying a forward yield of about 2.9% at a $70 share price. ^[18]
StockAnalysis and other data providers put Coca‑Cola’s payout ratio around 65–68% of earnings, leaving room for reinvestment while still returning a meaningful share of profits to shareholders. ^[19]
Dividend.com notes that KO has recorded 64 consecutive years of dividend increases, and Sure Dividend lists Coca‑Cola among the “Dividend Kings”—companies with 50+ straight years of dividend growth, where KO sits in the small group of mega‑cap members. ^[20]

Dividend growth has been steady but not explosive: StockAnalysis data shows roughly 5% annual dividend growth over the past year and mid‑single‑digit growth over longer periods, consistent with Coca‑Cola’s mature, cash‑generative profile. ^[21]

Combined with the mid‑teens total return over the last year, this positions KO squarely as a slow‑and‑steady total‑return compounder, not a high‑yield or hyper‑growth play.

How Wall Street sees Coca-Cola stock: price targets and upside

Across major forecast providers, analysts remain broadly bullish on KO, with price targets clustered in the high‑$70s.

Consensus 12‑month price targets

Recent numbers as of early December 2025:

Investing.com (23 analysts):
- Average 12‑month target:$79.13
- Range:$72 – $85
- Consensus rating:“Buy”
- Implied upside: about 13% from ~$70. ^[22]
StockAnalysis (13 analysts):
- Average target:$78.15
- Low / high:$70 / $83
- Consensus rating:“Strong Buy”, with a mix of Buy and Strong Buy recommendations.
- Implied upside: around 11–12%. ^[23]
MarketBeat:
- Aggregates roughly 17 analyst ratings, with an overall “Buy” consensus and an average target near $78.43. ^[24]
Benzinga:
- Uses data from 20 analysts, finding a consensus target of $76.84, with a high of $83 and low of $70, and a consensus “Buy” rating. ^[25]

A detailed December forecast from 24/7 Wall St quotes a median Wall Street one‑year target near $79.08 and characterizes the overall rating as “Strong Buy”, while its own internal model projects a somewhat more conservative 2025 price of $76 per share. ^[26]

Fundamental and DCF-based valuations

Beyond simple price targets, several analyses suggest Coca‑Cola may trade below estimated intrinsic value:

A discounted cash‑flow (DCF)–based article recently cited by Yahoo Finance argues that, with KO near $70, the stock trades at roughly a 21–22% discount to its modeled fair value. ^[27]
A Seeking Alpha deep‑dive on December 5 frames Coca‑Cola as offering around 14% upside, driven by margin expansion, cash flow recovery and continued dividend growth. ^[28]
Simply Wall St’s December 6 piece assesses KO after a 15% one‑year climb, concluding that the recent pullback has not erased the longer‑term upward trend and that the valuation remains consistent with a defensive compounder rather than a deep‑value turnaround. ^[29]

Put together, these views suggest that most analysts see mid‑single to low‑teens price appreciation on top of the current ~3% dividend yield, implying potential total returns in the low‑ to mid‑teens if forecasts prove accurate.

Valuation snapshot: not cheap, but in line with a defensive giant

On traditional valuation metrics, Coca‑Cola looks neither screamingly cheap nor obviously stretched for a global consumer staple:

Recent data from Dividend.com and Zacks show KO trading at roughly 23–24x trailing earnings and around 22x forward earnings, with a P/E‑to‑growth (PEG) ratio near 3.9. ^[30]
Beta remains very low (around 0.4), and the stock is about 6% below its 52‑week high, with a 52‑week range of roughly $60.62 to $74.38. ^[31]

That multiple is a premium to the broader market, but in line with what investors have historically been willing to pay for Coca‑Cola’s combination of:

extremely durable brands,
global distribution,
consistent free‑cash‑flow generation, and
a long track record of defensive performance in downturns.

For investors who demand rapid earnings growth, KO’s valuation may appear rich relative to its mid‑single‑digit organic revenue growth and modest EPS growth, but for those focused on stability and income, the valuation is broadly consistent with its peer group.

Long-term growth drivers highlighted in recent research

Several recent forecasts emphasize similar long‑term growth themes for Coca‑Cola:

Diversification beyond carbonated soft drinks
24/7 Wall St underscores Coca‑Cola’s expansion into water, tea, coffee, juice, dairy and energy (including the Costa Coffee acquisition) as a key driver of growth relative to peers that were quicker to diversify away from sugary sodas. ^[32]
Digital and AI‑driven execution
The same report describes Coca‑Cola’s AI‑enabled marketing and data platforms—like its “Studio X” initiative and e‑commerce tools—as important in improving response times, demand forecasting and campaign efficiency, effectively squeezing more profit out of each marketing dollar. ^[33]
Emerging markets expansion
Coca‑Cola has been investing heavily outside North America, including a more than $1.4 billion commitment to Argentina and a rapidly growing footprint in India, which has become one of its largest markets by volume. ^[34]
Alcohol ready‑to‑drink (RTD) and new categories
Partnerships like Jack Daniel’s & Coca‑Cola, Absolut & Sprite and newer RTD offerings such as Peace Hard Tea are seen as an additional growth vector, leveraging familiar brands into adjacent categories. ^[35]

These themes all rest on a simple thesis: Coca‑Cola can use its branding muscle, data and distribution network to nudge mid‑single‑digit top‑line growth while keeping margins high, then layer a steady dividend on top.

Key risks analysts are watching

Recent coverage also flags several risks and pressure points:

Currency and macro risk – With a large share of revenue generated outside the United States, Coca‑Cola remains exposed to FX swings and political risk in emerging markets. 24/7 Wall St notes that managing and hedging this exposure can be costly, and that rising independence from the U.S. dollar in some regions adds uncertainty. ^[36]
Valuation vs. growth – With a mid‑20s P/E and PEG near 4, KO is not a deep‑value stock. If growth slows or margins compress, the multiple could prove vulnerable. ^[37]
Consumer preferences and regulation – Sugary beverages face ongoing pressure from health trends and sugar‑tax policies, and while Coca‑Cola has diversified, its core profit engine is still tied to beverages that can be targeted by regulators. (This is a broad industry risk rather than specific to one recent article.)
Execution on refranchising and portfolio shifts – While selling down bottling stakes boosts margins and returns capital, it also reduces direct control over some parts of the value chain; success depends on bottling partners maintaining high standards and alignment with Coca‑Cola’s strategic goals. ^[38]

None of these risks are new, but they frame the bear case: KO is a high‑quality franchise that could still disappoint if growth slows while the valuation remains rich.

Bottom line: how does Coca-Cola stock look on December 7, 2025?

Pulling the latest data together:

Price and yield: Around $70 per share, ~2.9% dividend yield, with more than 60 consecutive years of dividend increases. ^[39]
Recent performance: Low‑volatility, mid‑teens total return over the last year, and mid‑teens YTD gains despite a modest early‑December pullback. ^[40]
Fundamentals: Solid Q3 2025 beat on both revenue and EPS, plus a 120‑basis‑point expansion in comparable operating margin as efficiency programs take hold. ^[41]
Analyst view: Broad “Buy” to “Strong Buy” consensus, with average 12‑month targets in the high‑$70s, implying roughly 10–13% upside on top of the dividend, and several DCF‑based models suggesting low‑double‑digit to low‑20s percent undervaluation. ^[42]

For income and defensive investors, KO continues to look like what it has been for decades: a high‑quality, low‑beta compounder that offers a dependable dividend and moderate capital appreciation potential rather than explosive growth.

For valuation‑sensitive investors, the story is more nuanced. The stock price already bakes in a meaningful “quality premium,” and the bull case now rests on continued margin discipline, steady emerging‑market growth and the successful execution of digital and portfolio strategies outlined in recent management commentary and third‑party analysis.