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 Applied Materials (AMAT) spend its free cash flow?

For TTM through Q2 2026, Applied Materials generated $7.99B of operating cash flow and $5.97B of free cash flow — a free cash flow margin of 74.6% of operating cash flow. The waterfall breaks down how the remaining cash was allocated across investing and financing activities.

How much did Applied Materials (AMAT) return via buybacks and dividends?

The waterfall shows buybacks (share repurchases) and dividends paid as separate steps in the financing section. Together these represent Applied Materials's shareholder returns for TTM through Q2 2026. You can compare these against free cash flow to assess the capital-return payout ratio.

Applied Materials (AMAT) Cash Flow Waterfall

Operating CF

$7.99B

Capex

-$2.03B

Free Cash Flow

$5.97B

FCF Margin

+74.6%

Cash flow waterfall for Applied Materials (AMAT) — TTM through Q2 2026

Free cash flow: $5.97B

Cash flow breakdown for Applied Materials (AMAT) — TTM through Q2 2026

Line item	Amount	Running total
Operating Cash Flow	$7.99B	$7.99B
Capital Expenditure	-$2.03B	$5.97B
Free Cash Flow	$5.97B	$5.97B
Acquisitions	$175M	$6.14B
Other Investing	-$856M	$5.28B
Share Buybacks	-$2.07B	$3.21B
Dividends Paid	-$1.1B	$2.12B
Net Debt Change	$191M	$2.31B
Other Financing & FX	-$316M	$1.99B
Net Cash Increase	$1.99B	$1.99B

Operating Cash Flow$7.99B
Capital Expenditure-$2.03B
Free Cash Flow$5.97B
Acquisitions$175M
Other Investing-$856M
Share Buybacks-$2.07B
Dividends Paid-$1.1B
Net Debt Change$191M
Other Financing & FX-$316M
Net Cash Increase$1.99B

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

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