We have updated our forecasts for The Coca-Cola Co. after receiving an update on the company's fiscal 2016 earnings and on its bottler refranchising implementation, which will likely be largely completed by year-end 2017. We do not expect the company's leverage will reduce by as much as we previously anticipated, partly because the timing of the company's pending acquisition of Coca-Cola Beverages Africa will preclude any debt reduction this year, while foreign currency effects and lower cash generation will likely hamper future debt reduction. As a result, we see a risk that the company's credit metrics may not improve and it will be unable to sustain debt to EBITDA closer to 2x upon completion of its bottler refranchising. We are
