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 SpaceX (SPCX) spend its free cash flow?

For FY 2025, SpaceX generated $6.79B of operating cash flow and -$14B of free cash flow — a free cash flow margin of -205.6% of operating cash flow. The waterfall breaks down how the remaining cash was allocated across investing and financing activities.

How much did SpaceX (SPCX) return via buybacks and dividends?

The waterfall shows buybacks (share repurchases) and dividends paid as separate steps in the financing section. Together these represent SpaceX's shareholder returns for FY 2025. You can compare these against free cash flow to assess the capital-return payout ratio.

SpaceX (SPCX) Cash Flow Waterfall

Operating CF

$6.79B

Capex

-$20.7B

Free Cash Flow

-$14B

FCF Margin

-205.6%

Cash flow waterfall for SpaceX (SPCX) — FY 2025

Free cash flow: -$14B

Cash flow breakdown for SpaceX (SPCX) — FY 2025

Line item	Amount	Running total
Operating Cash Flow	$6.79B	$6.79B
Capital Expenditure	-$20.7B	-$14B
Free Cash Flow	-$14B	-$14B
Other Investing	$1.16B	-$12.8B
Share Buybacks	-$1.13B	-$13.9B
Net Debt Change	$8.9B	-$5.01B
Other Financing & FX	$18.6B	$13.6B
Net Cash Increase	$13.6B	$13.6B

Operating Cash Flow$6.79B
Capital Expenditure-$20.7B
Free Cash Flow-$14B
Other Investing$1.16B
Share Buybacks-$1.13B
Net Debt Change$8.9B
Other Financing & FX$18.6B
Net Cash Increase$13.6B

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

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