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 Netflix (NFLX) spend its free cash flow?

For TTM through Q2 2026, Netflix generated $11.8B of operating cash flow and $11B of free cash flow — a free cash flow margin of 93.1% of operating cash flow. The waterfall breaks down how the remaining cash was allocated across investing and financing activities.

How much did Netflix (NFLX) return via buybacks and dividends?

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

Netflix (NFLX) Cash Flow Waterfall

Operating CF

$11.8B

Capex

-$819M

Free Cash Flow

$11B

FCF Margin

+93.1%

Cash flow waterfall for Netflix (NFLX) — TTM through Q2 2026

Free cash flow: $11B

Cash flow breakdown for Netflix (NFLX) — TTM through Q2 2026

Line item	Amount	Running total
Operating Cash Flow	$11.8B	$11.8B
Capital Expenditure	-$819M	$11B
Free Cash Flow	$11B	$11B
Acquisitions	-$586M	$10.4B
Other Investing	$191M	$10.6B
Share Buybacks	-$9.92B	$679M
Other Financing & FX	-$4.57B	-$3.89B
Net Cash Decrease	-$3.89B	-$3.89B

Operating Cash Flow$11.8B
Capital Expenditure-$819M
Free Cash Flow$11B
Acquisitions-$586M
Other Investing$191M
Share Buybacks-$9.92B
Other Financing & FX-$4.57B
Net Cash Decrease-$3.89B

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

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