“we expect that part of the timing of working capital initiatives that benefited 2024 free cash flow will reverse and impact 2025 free cash flow.”

In context

“year 2025. Our underlying effective tax rate for 2025 is expected to increase to 20.8% and which is driven primarily by the impact of several countries enacting the global minimum tax regulations. All in, we expect comparable earnings per share growth of 2% to 3% and versus $2.88 in 2024. Excluding the fair life contingent consideration payment, we expect to generate approximately $9.5 billion of free cash flow in 2025 through approximately $11.7 billion in cash from operations, less approximately $2.2 billion in capital investments. Included in this guidance are 2 items to highlight: One, a $1.2 billion transition tax payment, an increase of approximately $240 million versus 2024. This is the final year that we will make a payment related to the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017. Number two, we expect that part of the timing of working capital initiatives that benefited 2024 free cash flow will reverse and impact 2025 free cash flow. Driven by our underlying cash flow generation, we have flexibility to invest in our business and return capital to shareowners. A significant portion of our expected capital investment is to build capacity for fairlife and to continue to invest in our system in India and Africa. With respect to acquisitions and divestitures, we're making good progress on our agenda. Since 2006, we've added $9 billion brands via acquisition. Importantly, only 3 of these brands were $1 billion-dollar brands at the time of acquisition, demonstrating progress in scaling acquisitions. In 2024, we realized $3.5 billion in gross proceeds from refranchising bottling investments as a percent of consolidated net revenue is 13%, down from 52% in 2015. Return on invested capital is up 6 points at the same time. Relat”