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 Royal Caribbean Cruises (RCL) spend its free cash flow?

For TTM through Q1 2026, Royal Caribbean Cruises generated $6.67B of operating cash flow and $1.37B of free cash flow — a free cash flow margin of 20.5% of operating cash flow. The waterfall breaks down how the remaining cash was allocated across investing and financing activities.

How much did Royal Caribbean Cruises (RCL) return via buybacks and dividends?

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

Royal Caribbean Cruises (RCL) Cash Flow Waterfall

Operating CF

$6.67B

Capex

-$5.3B

Free Cash Flow

$1.37B

FCF Margin

+20.5%

Cash flow waterfall for Royal Caribbean Cruises (RCL) — TTM through Q1 2026

Free cash flow: $1.37B

Cash flow breakdown for Royal Caribbean Cruises (RCL) — TTM through Q1 2026

Line item	Amount	Running total
Operating Cash Flow	$6.67B	$6.67B
Capital Expenditure	-$5.3B	$1.37B
Free Cash Flow	$1.37B	$1.37B
Other Investing	$200M	$1.57B
Share Buybacks	-$1.75B	-$183M
Dividends Paid	-$386M	-$569M
Net Debt Change	$448M	-$121M
Other Financing & FX	$247M	$126M
Net Cash Increase	$126M	$126M

Operating Cash Flow$6.67B
Capital Expenditure-$5.3B
Free Cash Flow$1.37B
Other Investing$200M
Share Buybacks-$1.75B
Dividends Paid-$386M
Net Debt Change$448M
Other Financing & FX$247M
Net Cash Increase$126M

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

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