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 Salesforce (CRM) spend its free cash flow?

For TTM through Q2 2026, Salesforce generated $15.2B of operating cash flow and $14.7B of free cash flow — a free cash flow margin of 96.3% of operating cash flow. The waterfall breaks down how the remaining cash was allocated across investing and financing activities.

How much did Salesforce (CRM) return via buybacks and dividends?

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

Salesforce (CRM) Cash Flow Waterfall

Operating CF

$15.2B

Capex

-$560M

Free Cash Flow

$14.7B

FCF Margin

+96.3%

Cash flow waterfall for Salesforce (CRM) — TTM through Q2 2026

Free cash flow: $14.7B

Cash flow breakdown for Salesforce (CRM) — TTM through Q2 2026

Line item	Amount	Running total
Operating Cash Flow	$15.2B	$15.2B
Capital Expenditure	-$560M	$14.7B
Free Cash Flow	$14.7B	$14.7B
Acquisitions	-$10.7B	$3.94B
Other Investing	$2.07B	$6.02B
Share Buybacks	-$37.2B	-$31.2B
Dividends Paid	-$1.55B	-$32.7B
Net Debt Change	$30B	-$2.72B
Other Financing	$652M	-$2.07B
Forex Effect	$2.05B	-$17M
Net Cash Decrease	-$17M	-$17M

Operating Cash Flow$15.2B
Capital Expenditure-$560M
Free Cash Flow$14.7B
Acquisitions-$10.7B
Other Investing$2.07B
Share Buybacks-$37.2B
Dividends Paid-$1.55B
Net Debt Change$30B
Other Financing$652M
Forex Effect$2.05B
Net Cash Decrease-$17M

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

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