Coca-Cola (KO) Competitors

PepsiCo (NASDAQ:PEP) and Coca-Cola (NYSE:KO) are both large-cap consumer staples companies, but which is the superior stock? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their risk, valuation, institutional ownership, community ranking, earnings, profitability, dividends, media sentiment and analyst recommendations.

Do insiders & institutionals hold more shares of PEP or KO?

73.1% of PepsiCo shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 70.3% of Coca-Cola shares are held by institutional investors. 0.1% of PepsiCo shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 1.0% of Coca-Cola shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.

Do analysts prefer PEP or KO?

PepsiCo currently has a consensus target price of $160.69, indicating a potential upside of 20.14%. Coca-Cola has a consensus target price of $75.59, indicating a potential upside of 5.44%. Given PepsiCo's higher possible upside, research analysts plainly believe PepsiCo is more favorable than Coca-Cola.

Company	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
PepsiCo	1 Sell rating(s)	13 Hold rating(s)	4 Buy rating(s)	0 Strong Buy rating(s)	2.17
Coca-Cola	0 Sell rating(s)	1 Hold rating(s)	17 Buy rating(s)	2 Strong Buy rating(s)	3.05

Does the MarketBeat Community believe in PEP or KO?

Coca-Cola received 96 more outperform votes than PepsiCo when rated by MarketBeat users. Likewise, 68.28% of users gave Coca-Cola an outperform vote while only 67.19% of users gave PepsiCo an outperform vote.

Company	Underperform	Outperform
PepsiCo	Outperform Votes 1120 67.19%	Underperform Votes 547 32.81%
Coca-Cola	Outperform Votes 1216 68.28%	Underperform Votes 565 31.72%

Which has stronger valuation and earnings, PEP or KO?

Coca-Cola has lower revenue, but higher earnings than PepsiCo. PepsiCo is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Coca-Cola, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Company	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
PepsiCo	$91.52B	2.00	$9.58B	$6.80	19.67
Coca-Cola	$46.89B	6.58	$10.63B	$2.50	28.68

Is PEP or KO more profitable?

Coca-Cola has a net margin of 22.59% compared to PepsiCo's net margin of 10.43%. PepsiCo's return on equity of 58.87% beat Coca-Cola's return on equity.

Company	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
PepsiCo	10.43%	58.87%	11.28%
Coca-Cola	22.59%	45.37%	12.24%

Does the media favor PEP or KO?

In the previous week, Coca-Cola had 74 more articles in the media than PepsiCo. MarketBeat recorded 142 mentions for Coca-Cola and 68 mentions for PepsiCo. Coca-Cola's average media sentiment score of 0.88 beat PepsiCo's score of 0.57 indicating that Coca-Cola is being referred to more favorably in the news media.

Company	Very Positive	Positive	Neutral	Negative	Very Negative	Overall Sentiment
PepsiCo	33 Very Positive mention(s)	7 Positive mention(s)	14 Neutral mention(s)	11 Negative mention(s)	2 Very Negative mention(s)	Positive
Coca-Cola	76 Very Positive mention(s)	19 Positive mention(s)	30 Neutral mention(s)	10 Negative mention(s)	2 Very Negative mention(s)	Positive

Is PEP or KO a better dividend stock?

PepsiCo pays an annual dividend of $5.42 per share and has a dividend yield of 4.1%. Coca-Cola pays an annual dividend of $2.04 per share and has a dividend yield of 2.8%. PepsiCo pays out 79.7% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future. Coca-Cola pays out 81.6% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future. PepsiCo has increased its dividend for 53 consecutive years and Coca-Cola has increased its dividend for 64 consecutive years. PepsiCo is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and lower payout ratio.

Which has more risk and volatility, PEP or KO?

PepsiCo has a beta of 0.49, suggesting that its stock price is 51% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Coca-Cola has a beta of 0.45, suggesting that its stock price is 55% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Summary

Coca-Cola beats PepsiCo on 14 of the 22 factors compared between the two stocks.