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 Medtronic (MDT) spend its free cash flow?

For TTM through Q2 2026, Medtronic generated $7.33B of operating cash flow and $5.43B of free cash flow — a free cash flow margin of 74% of operating cash flow. The waterfall breaks down how the remaining cash was allocated across investing and financing activities.

How much did Medtronic (MDT) return via buybacks and dividends?

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

Medtronic (MDT) Cash Flow Waterfall

Operating CF

$7.33B

Capex

-$1.9B

Free Cash Flow

$5.43B

FCF Margin

+74.0%

Cash flow waterfall for Medtronic (MDT) — TTM through Q2 2026

Free cash flow: $5.43B

Cash flow breakdown for Medtronic (MDT) — TTM through Q2 2026

Line item	Amount	Running total
Operating Cash Flow	$7.33B	$7.33B
Capital Expenditure	-$1.9B	$5.43B
Free Cash Flow	$5.43B	$5.43B
Acquisitions	-$406M	$5.02B
Other Investing	-$624M	$4.4B
Share Buybacks	-$1.04B	$3.36B
Dividends Paid	-$3.64B	-$278M
Net Debt Change	-$1.17B	-$1.45B
Other Financing & FX	$1.18B	-$269M
Net Cash Decrease	-$269M	-$269M

Operating Cash Flow$7.33B
Capital Expenditure-$1.9B
Free Cash Flow$5.43B
Acquisitions-$406M
Other Investing-$624M
Share Buybacks-$1.04B
Dividends Paid-$3.64B
Net Debt Change-$1.17B
Other Financing & FX$1.18B
Net Cash Decrease-$269M

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

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