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 Citizens Financial Group (CFG) spend its free cash flow?

For TTM through Q1 2026, Citizens Financial Group generated $2.66B of operating cash flow and $2.5B of free cash flow — a free cash flow margin of 94% of operating cash flow. The waterfall breaks down how the remaining cash was allocated across investing and financing activities.

How much did Citizens Financial Group (CFG) return via buybacks and dividends?

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

Citizens Financial Group (CFG) Cash Flow Waterfall

Operating CF

$2.66B

Capex

-$160M

Free Cash Flow

$2.5B

FCF Margin

+94.0%

Cash flow waterfall for Citizens Financial Group (CFG) — TTM through Q1 2026

Free cash flow: $2.5B

Note: Other Investing is large — driven mainly by purchases or sales of investments.

Cash flow breakdown for Citizens Financial Group (CFG) — TTM through Q1 2026

Line item	Amount	Running total
Operating Cash Flow	$2.66B	$2.66B
Capital Expenditure	-$160M	$2.5B
Free Cash Flow	$2.5B	$2.5B
Other Investing	-$6.5B	-$4B
Share Buybacks	-$1.1B	-$5.1B
Dividends Paid	-$904M	-$6B
Net Debt Change	$690M	-$5.31B
Other Financing & FX	$6.1B	$789M
Net Cash Increase	$789M	$789M

Operating Cash Flow$2.66B
Capital Expenditure-$160M
Free Cash Flow$2.5B
Other Investing-$6.5B
Share Buybacks-$1.1B
Dividends Paid-$904M
Net Debt Change$690M
Other Financing & FX$6.1B
Net Cash Increase$789M

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

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