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 Thermo Fisher Scientific (TMO) spend its free cash flow?

For TTM through Q1 2026, Thermo Fisher Scientific generated $8.29B of operating cash flow and $6.75B of free cash flow — a free cash flow margin of 81.4% of operating cash flow. The waterfall breaks down how the remaining cash was allocated across investing and financing activities.

How much did Thermo Fisher Scientific (TMO) return via buybacks and dividends?

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

Thermo Fisher Scientific (TMO) Cash Flow Waterfall

Operating CF

$8.29B

Capex

-$1.54B

Free Cash Flow

$6.75B

FCF Margin

+81.4%

Cash flow waterfall for Thermo Fisher Scientific (TMO) — TTM through Q1 2026

Free cash flow: $6.75B

Cash flow breakdown for Thermo Fisher Scientific (TMO) — TTM through Q1 2026

Line item	Amount	Running total
Operating Cash Flow	$8.29B	$8.29B
Capital Expenditure	-$1.54B	$6.75B
Free Cash Flow	$6.75B	$6.75B
Acquisitions	-$12.9B	-$6.13B
Other Investing	$1.94B	-$4.19B
Share Buybacks	-$4B	-$8.19B
Dividends Paid	-$649M	-$8.84B
Net Debt Change	$2.21B	-$6.63B
Other Financing	$5.43B	-$1.2B
Forex Effect	$307M	-$891M
Net Cash Decrease	-$892M	-$892M

Operating Cash Flow$8.29B
Capital Expenditure-$1.54B
Free Cash Flow$6.75B
Acquisitions-$12.9B
Other Investing$1.94B
Share Buybacks-$4B
Dividends Paid-$649M
Net Debt Change$2.21B
Other Financing$5.43B
Forex Effect$307M
Net Cash Decrease-$892M

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

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