Dividend Stock Portfolio For Retirement: Top 5 Stock Picks

4. The Coca-Cola Company (NYSE:KO)

Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 87

On May 21, Barclays raised its price recommendation on The Coca-Cola Company (NYSE:KO) to $89 from $85. It reiterated an Overweight rating on the shares.

During the Q1 2026 earnings call, President & CFO John Murphy said the company continued to expect organic revenue growth of 4% to 5% for 2026. He also noted that management now expected comparable currency-neutral EPS growth, excluding acquisitions and divestitures, to come in between 6% and 7%.

Murphy added that the company now projected comparable earnings per share growth of 8% to 9% compared to the $3 reported in 2025. He said this was higher than the previous forecast of 7% to 8%, mainly because of a lower expected effective tax rate.

According to Murphy, Coca-Cola now expects its 2026 underlying effective tax rate to be 19.9%, which is one percentage point lower than the earlier estimate. He also said divestitures were still expected to create an approximate four-point headwind to comparable net revenue and about a one-point headwind to comparable earnings per share. These projections assume that the pending sale of Coca-Cola Beverages Africa will close in the second half of 2026.

The Coca-Cola Company (NYSE:KO) is a global beverage company with operations across Europe, the Middle East and Africa, Latin America, North America, Asia Pacific, and Bottling Investments. The company sells multiple beverage brands across a wide range of categories worldwide.