Yahoo Finance Here’s How Much a $1,000 Investment in Coca-Cola Stock 10 Years Ago Would Be Worth Today
Coca-Cola (KO) is one of the world’s most iconic brands, with a most recent fiscal year revenue of $43 billion. Not bad, but not surprising for a company that includes brands like Sprite, Fanta, Coke Zero, Diet Coke, and others. Coca-Cola sells more than two billion drinks per day and has a presence in more than 200 countries.
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Things were not always fizzing for the premier soft drink company, however. Coca-Cola was invented in Atlanta, Georgia, by pharmacist Dr. John Stith Pemberton in 1886 and originally sold for $0.05 a glass at the nearby pharmacy’s soda fountain. While people did enjoy the taste, the modest sales of nine drinks per day didn’t allow Pemberton to escape his day job.
That obviously changed. Unfortunately, Pemberton, who died in 1888, would never see its success, which only strengthened over the decades. Today, Coca-Cola is the world’s top-selling soft drink, according to World Population Review.
The drink has had its share of controversies, however. Perhaps chief among them is the often exaggerated claim that Coca-Cola had cocaine as one of its ingredients. In fact, this claim has persisted in modern times. The truth is that, according to the New York Times, the original formula did contain small amounts of the drug, which was legal at the time, but not as much as many claimed.
Today, the drink still contains coca, but no cocaine. As a company spokesperson told the New York Times in 1988, “Ingredients from the coca leaf are used, but there is no cocaine in it and it is all tightly overseen by regulatory authorities.” Famously, very few people know the formula for Coca-Cola, which is locked in a bank vault.
One thing is certain, though: Buying Coca-Cola stock over the past decades has been a formula for success among investors. Consider this scenario: Because of Coca-Cola’s numerous splits and continued dividend payments over the decades, if by chance your great-grandmother had bought just one share at its original 1919 price of $40, never sold it and left it to you, you would own over 320,000 shares worth well over $19.5 million today. Not bad for a sugary fountain drink.
But few of our ancestors had that sort of foresight. So, how much would your Coke shares be worth today if you invested $1,000 in April 2014? You would have more than doubled your money, with a total investment worth of $2,029.55. That’s a 103% return, or a 7.23% annual rate of return.
Interestingly, despite Coke’s dominance on the world stage, investing in Coke’s main rival, Pepsi, 10 years ago would have given you more pop for your buck. If you had invested that same $1,000 in Pepsi in 2014, your investment would be worth $2,714.63 today. That’s an annual return of 10.48% and a total return of 171.46%.
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This article originally appeared on GOBankingRates.com: Here’s How Much a $1,000 Investment in Coca-Cola Stock 10 Years Ago Would Be Worth Today