What is a cash flow waterfall?

A cash flow waterfall is a bar chart that walks from operating cash flow through capital expenditure to free cash flow, then shows how the remaining cash is allocated — acquisitions, buybacks, dividends, debt, and other financing — ending at the net change in cash. Each step is colour-coded: green bars add to the running total, red bars subtract.

How does Archer-Daniels-Midland (ADM) spend its free cash flow?

For TTM through Q1 2026, Archer-Daniels-Midland generated $5.94B of operating cash flow and $4.79B of free cash flow — a free cash flow margin of 80.6% of operating cash flow. The waterfall breaks down how the remaining cash was allocated across investing and financing activities.

How much did Archer-Daniels-Midland (ADM) return via buybacks and dividends?

The waterfall shows buybacks (share repurchases) and dividends paid as separate steps in the financing section. Together these represent Archer-Daniels-Midland's shareholder returns for TTM through Q1 2026. You can compare these against free cash flow to assess the capital-return payout ratio.

Archer-Daniels-Midland (ADM) Cash Flow Waterfall

Operating CF

$5.94B

Capex

-$1.15B

Free Cash Flow

$4.79B

FCF Margin

+80.6%

Cash flow waterfall for Archer-Daniels-Midland (ADM) — TTM through Q1 2026

Free cash flow: $4.79B

Cash flow breakdown for Archer-Daniels-Midland (ADM) — TTM through Q1 2026

Line item	Amount	Running total
Operating Cash Flow	$5.94B	$5.94B
Capital Expenditure	-$1.15B	$4.79B
Free Cash Flow	$4.79B	$4.79B
Acquisitions	$173M	$4.97B
Other Investing	-$38M	$4.93B
Dividends Paid	-$994M	$3.93B
Net Debt Change	-$1.82B	$2.12B
Other Financing	-$49M	$2.07B
Forex Effect	-$4.51B	-$2.44B
Net Cash Decrease	-$2.43B	-$2.43B

Operating Cash Flow$5.94B
Capital Expenditure-$1.15B
Free Cash Flow$4.79B
Acquisitions$173M
Other Investing-$38M
Dividends Paid-$994M
Net Debt Change-$1.82B
Other Financing-$49M
Forex Effect-$4.51B
Net Cash Decrease-$2.43B

Want to see what drove the FCF change?Free Cash Flow Bridge

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