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 Digital Realty Trust (DLR) spend its free cash flow?

For TTM through Q1 2026, Digital Realty Trust generated $2.55B of operating cash flow and $1.15B of free cash flow — a free cash flow margin of 45.3% of operating cash flow. The waterfall breaks down how the remaining cash was allocated across investing and financing activities.

How much did Digital Realty Trust (DLR) return via buybacks and dividends?

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

Digital Realty Trust (DLR) Cash Flow Waterfall

Operating CF

$2.55B

Capex

-$1.39B

Free Cash Flow

$1.15B

FCF Margin

+45.3%

Cash flow waterfall for Digital Realty Trust (DLR) — TTM through Q1 2026

Free cash flow: $1.15B

Cash flow breakdown for Digital Realty Trust (DLR) — TTM through Q1 2026

Line item	Amount	Running total
Operating Cash Flow	$2.55B	$2.55B
Capital Expenditure	-$1.39B	$1.15B
Free Cash Flow	$1.15B	$1.15B
Acquisitions	-$755M	$399M
Other Investing	-$514M	-$115M
Dividends Paid	-$1.75B	-$1.87B
Net Debt Change	$938M	-$928M
Other Financing	$1.13B	$199M
Forex Effect	-$89.3M	$109M
Net Cash Increase	$109M	$109M

Operating Cash Flow$2.55B
Capital Expenditure-$1.39B
Free Cash Flow$1.15B
Acquisitions-$755M
Other Investing-$514M
Dividends Paid-$1.75B
Net Debt Change$938M
Other Financing$1.13B
Forex Effect-$89.3M
Net Cash Increase$109M

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

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Data & methodology

Digital Realty Trust (DLR) Key Financials

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Income Statement

Balance Sheet

Profitability

Operating Margin14.6%

Cash Flow

Capital Return

Forecast & Valuation

Operations

Employees4.3K

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