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 Coca-Cola (KO) spend its free cash flow?

For TTM through Q2 2026, Coca-Cola generated $14.6B of operating cash flow and $12.6B of free cash flow — a free cash flow margin of 85.9% of operating cash flow. The waterfall breaks down how the remaining cash was allocated across investing and financing activities.

How much did Coca-Cola (KO) return via buybacks and dividends?

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

Coca-Cola (KO) Cash Flow Waterfall

Operating CF

$14.6B

Capex

-$2.07B

Free Cash Flow

$12.6B

FCF Margin

+85.9%

Cash flow waterfall for Coca-Cola (KO) — TTM through Q2 2026

Free cash flow: $12.6B

Cash flow breakdown for Coca-Cola (KO) — TTM through Q2 2026

Line item	Amount	Running total
Operating Cash Flow	$14.6B	$14.6B
Capital Expenditure	-$2.07B	$12.6B
Free Cash Flow	$12.6B	$12.6B
Acquisitions	$2.67B	$15.2B
Other Investing	$3.48B	$18.7B
Share Buybacks	-$853M	$17.9B
Dividends Paid	-$11B	$6.89B
Net Debt Change	-$2.4B	$4.5B
Other Financing & FX	-$2.42B	$2.07B
Net Cash Increase	$2.07B	$2.07B

Operating Cash Flow$14.6B
Capital Expenditure-$2.07B
Free Cash Flow$12.6B
Acquisitions$2.67B
Other Investing$3.48B
Share Buybacks-$853M
Dividends Paid-$11B
Net Debt Change-$2.4B
Other Financing & FX-$2.42B
Net Cash Increase$2.07B

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

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