COCA-COLA CONSOLIDATED, INC. (COKE): what the price requires

The current priced-in claim for COCA-COLA CONSOLIDATED, INC. (COKE) is temporarily suppressed because the live engine record is unavailable. The dated report remains a snapshot, not a current market read.

Generated: 2026-07-19 · Source: https://boothcheck.com/report/COKE

Headline

FieldValue
TickerCOKE
CompanyCOCA-COLA CONSOLIDATED, INC.
Current price$178.63/sh

What The Price Requires (Inversion)

The assumption today's price embeds, recovered by inverting the valuation.

FieldValue
Inversion basiswhole-company
Operating margin today13.2%
Multiple paid4x operating income

The price sits below what even a 5%/yr operating-profit decline would warrant; the inversion reports a bound, not a solved growth path.

Solve inputs: computed at a 6% cost of capital with 4% terminal growth over a 5-year stage (computed at the 6% minimum rate; the CAPM rate 3.3% sits below it).

How unusual the bet is: within-range

ReferenceValue
vs own history-0.80σ
cohort percentile (of 69 peers)0
implied end-window share0%

Valuation X-Ray

The price is supported by earnings-power and relative-multiple value, while growth-DCF lands below the price. A value/asset-supported name, not a pure growth bet.

How the valuation models price the stock relative to the market price. Price/FV above 1.0 means the market pays more than that lens defends (expensive); at or below 1.0 the lens can defend the price.

FamilyMedian price/FVModelsReads
Asset—0—
Earnings0.37x1justifies
Relative0.12x2justifies
Growth1.83x2expensive

Families that justify the price: Earnings, Relative Families that call it expensive: Growth

The models below discount at their own flat-beta convention rates (cost of equity 9.3%, WACC 5.8%); the inversion above states its own rate.

Per-Model Detail (n=5)

ModelFamilyFVPrice/FVApplicableMethodology
DCF Perpetual GrowthGrowth——no—
DCF Exit MultipleGrowth$642.270.28xnoExit EV/EBITDA: 4.0x / 3.6x / 5.6x (bear / base = today's held flat / bull), 6yr
Relative ValuationRelative$1591.750.11xyesP/S fallback (negative EPS): Sector P/S 2.0x × TTM revenue — excluded from consensus
Simple DDMGrowth$76.422.34xyesDPS $7.07, g=0.0% (sustainable: ROE (TTM) × retention; not the terminal-growth assumption), ke=9.3%
Two-Stage DDMGrowth$135.761.32xyesStage 1: 5% for 5yr, Stage 2: 3.5% perpetual
Simple Excess ReturnAsset——no—
Two-Stage Excess ReturnAsset——no—
Discounted Future Market CapGrowth$153.181.17xnoRev $7.5B, growth 9% (input: historical growth; tapered), Terminal P/S: 0.2x / 0.2x / 0.3x (bear / base = today's held flat / bull, cap 8x)
Peter Lynch Fair ValueRelative$0.00—noNegative/zero EPS — earnings-based value floored at $0
Margin TrajectoryGrowth——no—
Earnings Power ValueEarnings$792.140.23xnoNormalized EBIT (5y avg op income, one-time charges added back) $0.79B × (1−26%) / WACC 5.8% → EPV (no growth)
Residual IncomeAsset——no—
Graham NumberAsset——no—
EV/EBITDA RelativeRelative$1501.460.12xyesEBITDA $1.20B × sector EV/EBITDA 14.0x
FCF YieldEarnings$481.300.37xyesFCF $661.4M / Kₑ 9.3% — zero-growth perpetuity
SBC-Adj FCF YieldEarnings——no—
Ben Graham FormulaEarnings——no—
ROIC-Justified P/BAsset——no—
P/Sales SectorRelative$1591.750.11xnoRevenue $7.49B × sector P/S 2.0x
PEG Fair ValueRelative——no—
Earnings YieldEarnings——no—
Funds From Operations MultipleRelative——no—
Clinical Phase NPVGrowth——no—
MertonAsset——no—
V5 Mechanical———no—

Solvency

FieldValue
Net debt$2.4b
Net debt / NOPAT (after-tax)3.45x
Net debt / operating income (pre-tax)2.54x
Burning cashno

Interest expense is not separately reported in the latest filings, so interest coverage cannot be computed.

Bullet Takeaways

Coca-Cola Consolidated screens with negative book equity, which looks alarming until you see the cause: a large share buyback, including purchasing all 18.8 million shares held by a Coca-Cola Company subsidiary at $127 in November 2025, drove retained earnings into deficit. This is capital return, not distress.

The operating business is solid and growing. First-quarter 2026 revenue rose 17% to $1.85 billion, EPS climbed to $1.68 from $1.19 (post a 10-for-1 split), and net income rose to $111.6 million. Free cash flow is robust at about $661 million.

The stock at $181.63 is supported by earnings-power and relative-multiple value rather than a growth story. Net debt of about $2.4 billion is roughly 2.4x operating income. The risks are concentrate-price dependence on its franchisor parent, commodity and tariff cost pressure, and customer concentration in Walmart and Kroger.

Bull Case

The biggest red flag a screen throws on Coca-Cola Consolidated is negative book equity, the kind of distress signal that normally means a company has destroyed its balance sheet. Here it means the opposite. The deficit was created by aggressive capital return: the company retired treasury stock from buybacks and recorded the excess of carrying value over par as a deduction from retained earnings, pushing retained earnings into a deficit (FY2025 10-K, accession 0001628280-26-009057). The capstone was buying all 18.8 million shares held by a subsidiary of The Coca-Cola Company on November 7, 2025 at $127 per share, a roughly $2.4 billion transaction that simplified the ownership structure and concentrated value in the remaining shareholders. A business that can return that much capital while still funding its operations is not distressed; it is a cash machine returning more than it retains. Once you see that, the alarm flips into the bull case.

The operating business behind the buyback is large, durable, and growing. Coca-Cola Consolidated is the largest Coca-Cola bottler in the United States, with an exclusive territorial franchise to distribute Coca-Cola products plus post-mix fountain sales, transportation revenue, and equipment maintenance (FY2025 10-K, accession 0001628280-26-009057). First-quarter 2026 revenue rose 17% to $1.85 billion, diluted EPS climbed to $1.68 from $1.19 on a post-split basis, and net income rose 7.7% to $111.6 million. The territorial bottling model is a genuine moat: within its franchised geography, Coca-Cola Consolidated is the sole distributor of the world's most recognized beverage brand, a position no competitor can replicate and that throws off consistent, defensive cash flow through economic cycles.

The valuation reflects a defensive cash generator rather than a growth bet. The engine reads the price as supported by earnings-power and relative-multiple value, with growth-DCF the only family calling it expensive. The two-stage dividend model lands near $136 and the discounted-future-market-cap read near $156, while the company generates about $661 million of free cash flow and carries manageable net debt of about $2.4 billion, roughly 2.4x operating income. The dividend is real and the buyback shrinks the share base. For an investor who wants a defensive consumer-staples cash flow with a structural local monopoly on Coca-Cola distribution, the negative-equity headline is a feature, not a bug: it is the visible result of management returning capital aggressively to owners. The operating margin near 13% and the steady volume base are what underwrite that return.

Bear Case

The most fragile assumption baked into the price is that margins hold, and the first-quarter print already showed them slipping. Profit margin fell to 6.0% from 6.6% a year earlier, driven by higher expenses, even as revenue grew 17%. That matters because a bottler is a thin-margin, high-volume business whose profitability swings with input costs it does not fully control. The company warns that rising costs to produce its products, to the extent not passed along to consumers, could make its products less affordable and hurt net sales and profitability, and it flags that across-the-board tariffs could substantially raise costs (FY2025 10-K, accession 0001628280-26-009057). Aluminum cans, PET resin, and sweeteners are the swing inputs, and pricing power has limits in a category where consumers are increasingly value-conscious. A valuation that relies on margin recovery or stability is exposed to exactly the cost pressure that just compressed the margin.

The structural dependence on the franchisor is the narrative under the moat. Coca-Cola Consolidated does not own the brand; it bottles and distributes it under agreements with The Coca-Cola Company, which sets concentrate prices. The same relationship that gives it an exclusive territory also means its largest cost input and its growth ceiling are partly controlled by its franchisor. If The Coca-Cola Company raises concentrate prices faster than the bottler can pass through, margins compress; the bottler is a price-taker on its single most important input. This is the part of the model the bull case treats as a moat but which is equally a dependency, and it is structurally outside the company's control.

The customer side adds concentration risk, and the capital structure removes the cushion. The company states plainly that the loss of Walmart or Kroger as a customer could have a material adverse effect on its operating and financial results, and that no other customer represented more than 10% of revenue (FY2025 10-K, accession 0001628280-26-009057). Two retailers therefore hold meaningful leverage over a low-margin distributor. Meanwhile the aggressive buyback that flatters per-share metrics has left the company with negative book equity, which means there is no equity cushion on the balance sheet if a bad year, a margin squeeze, and the $2.4 billion of net debt coincide. The capital return was shareholder-friendly in good times; it also leaves less room for error. A buyer here is paying for a stable, defensive bottler whose margins are under cost pressure, whose key input is controlled by its parent, and whose customer base is concentrated, with little balance-sheet slack behind it.

Valuation

Coca-Cola Consolidated is genuinely hard to value with the standard toolkit, because the large buyback has driven book equity and retained earnings negative, which trips the engine's distress filters and disables most of the asset-, earnings-, and projection-based methods even though the business is not distressed. The methods that survive are the dividend and cash-flow reads: the simple dividend model lands near $76, the two-stage dividend model near $136, the discounted-future-market-cap read near $156, and the FCF-yield read far higher. The honest takeaway is that no clean intrinsic anchor exists here; the business has to be valued on its cash flow and dividend, not its (negative) book.

On cash flow, the picture is reasonable. The company generates about $661 million of free cash flow, and the territorial bottling franchise produces steady, defensive earnings with an operating margin near 13%. At $181.63 (June 27, 2026) the stock trades at a mid-teens multiple of post-split earnings (EPS of $1.68 in the first quarter alone, annualizing toward the high single digits), which is a fair-to-modest multiple for a defensive consumer-staples cash generator with a local monopoly. The two-stage dividend value near $136 and the discounted-future-market-cap value near $156 suggest the price is somewhat ahead of the most conservative reads but within reach of the growth-leaning ones. The right way to think about it: this is a stable cash flow returning capital aggressively, priced like a defensive staple, with the negative equity a distraction from the underlying cash generation rather than a sign of trouble. The valuation hinges on margins stabilizing and the dividend and buyback continuing, both of which depend on input costs and the relationship with the franchisor.

Catalysts

First-quarter 2026 was the recent set-piece: revenue rose 17% to $1.85 billion, diluted EPS climbed to $1.68 from $1.19 on a post-split basis, and net income rose 7.7% to $111.6 million. Profit margin slipped to 6.0% from 6.6% a year earlier on higher expenses, the one soft spot in an otherwise strong top line. (Sources: Coca-Cola Consolidated Q1 2026 results via the company 8-K and StockTitan; Q1 2026 earnings report via MarketBeat.)

Two capital-structure events defined the recent period. The board executed a 10-for-1 forward stock split during the second quarter of 2025, with all prior per-share figures retroactively adjusted. And on November 7, 2025 the company purchased all 18.8 million shares held by a subsidiary of The Coca-Cola Company at $127 per share, a roughly $2.4 billion buyback that simplified the ownership structure and is the proximate cause of the negative book equity. (Sources: Coca-Cola Consolidated stock-split and share-repurchase disclosures via StockTitan and the company 8-K filings; Coca-Cola Consolidated FY2025 10-K.)

The forward watch items are margin- and cost-driven: whether the operating margin stabilizes against commodity and tariff pressure on aluminum, PET, and sweeteners; the trajectory of concentrate prices set by The Coca-Cola Company; volume and pricing trends with key customers Walmart and Kroger; and the continued pace of dividends and buybacks now that the balance sheet carries negative equity and about $2.4 billion of net debt. Each quarterly print is the key check on whether the margin pressure was a one-quarter expense issue or a trend. (Sources: Coca-Cola Consolidated FY2025 10-K cost, customer-concentration, and franchise disclosures; Q1 2026 results via the company 8-K.)

Peer Cohorts (Per Segment, With Filing Citations)

Nonalcoholic Beverages (reported)

All Other (reported)

Methodology Note

Fundamentals sourced from SEC EDGAR filings. Current price from Databento. The priced-in inversion and valuation x-ray are computed by the boothcheck engine; narrative composed by AI from the structured data.

View the full interactive COKE report on boothcheck