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 Lowe's Companies (LOW) spend its free cash flow?

For TTM through Q2 2026, Lowe's Companies generated $9.84B of operating cash flow and $7.62B of free cash flow — a free cash flow margin of 77.5% of operating cash flow. The waterfall breaks down how the remaining cash was allocated across investing and financing activities.

How much did Lowe's Companies (LOW) return via buybacks and dividends?

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

Lowe's Companies (LOW) Cash Flow Waterfall

Operating CF

$9.84B

Capex

-$2.22B

Free Cash Flow

$7.62B

FCF Margin

+77.5%

Cash flow waterfall for Lowe's Companies (LOW) — TTM through Q2 2026

Free cash flow: $7.62B

Cash flow breakdown for Lowe's Companies (LOW) — TTM through Q2 2026

Line item	Amount	Running total
Operating Cash Flow	$9.84B	$9.84B
Capital Expenditure	-$2.22B	$7.62B
Free Cash Flow	$7.62B	$7.62B
Acquisitions	-$10.1B	-$2.46B
Other Investing	$66M	-$2.4B
Share Buybacks	-$462M	-$2.86B
Dividends Paid	-$2.67B	-$5.52B
Net Debt Change	$3.17B	-$2.36B
Other Financing & FX	$89M	-$2.27B
Net Cash Decrease	-$2.27B	-$2.27B

Operating Cash Flow$9.84B
Capital Expenditure-$2.22B
Free Cash Flow$7.62B
Acquisitions-$10.1B
Other Investing$66M
Share Buybacks-$462M
Dividends Paid-$2.67B
Net Debt Change$3.17B
Other Financing & FX$89M
Net Cash Decrease-$2.27B

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

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