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 Pfizer (PFE) spend its free cash flow?

For TTM through Q1 2026, Pfizer generated $12B of operating cash flow and $9.48B of free cash flow — a free cash flow margin of 79.1% of operating cash flow. The waterfall breaks down how the remaining cash was allocated across investing and financing activities.

How much did Pfizer (PFE) return via buybacks and dividends?

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

Pfizer (PFE) Cash Flow Waterfall

Operating CF

$12B

Capex

-$2.5B

Free Cash Flow

$9.48B

FCF Margin

+79.1%

Cash flow waterfall for Pfizer (PFE) — TTM through Q1 2026

Free cash flow: $9.48B

Cash flow breakdown for Pfizer (PFE) — TTM through Q1 2026

Line item	Amount	Running total
Operating Cash Flow	$12B	$12B
Capital Expenditure	-$2.5B	$9.48B
Free Cash Flow	$9.48B	$9.48B
Acquisitions	-$13.2B	-$3.75B
Other Investing	$11.9B	$8.15B
Dividends Paid	-$9.78B	-$1.63B
Net Debt Change	$2.23B	$599M
Other Financing & FX	-$324M	$275M
Net Cash Increase	$275M	$275M

Operating Cash Flow$12B
Capital Expenditure-$2.5B
Free Cash Flow$9.48B
Acquisitions-$13.2B
Other Investing$11.9B
Dividends Paid-$9.78B
Net Debt Change$2.23B
Other Financing & FX-$324M
Net Cash Increase$275M

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

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