Most companies burn cash to triple their revenue. Micron is gushing it.
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✦ The bottom line
Micron made $20B in cash in six months — up from $7B. Even after spending $12B building new factories.
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✦ Teach me
Real cash left over
All the cash left after running the business and building the next round of factories. Money Micron can save, hand back to owners, or use to grow further.
Beats "profit" — profit is partly an accounting opinion. Cash either showed up or it didn't.
Wall Street calls this
Free cash flow
If you learn one Wall Street number, learn this one. Cash is the cleanest read of a business.
Cash the business generated · 6 months
$20.3
B
Up from $7.2B a year earlier. Almost three times more cash from running the business.
$20 billion of cash flowing in is the gross number — what running the business produced. But cash flowing in tells you only half the story. The other half: cash flowing out — into the factories that make the next round of chips possible. Memory factories are enormously expensive — billions per facility, years to build. So how much of this cash is Micron pouring right back out the door?
But they're spending heavily too · 6 months
$11.8
B
Spent on new factories and equipment (mostly for HBM — the memory AI needs). The boom is being plowed back into more capacity.
So: $20B in, $12B back out into factories. Most companies in heavy industries would have very little left after that kind of capital spending — that's why memory has been a feast-or-famine business for decades. Boom years generate cash; the next bust spends it all back into the next factory. The question that matters is what remains — the cash left over once you've paid for the future you're building.
Real cash left over · 6 months
$8.5
B
Cash generated minus . Even after pouring billions into new factories, Micron's keeping nearly $9B. The cash spigot is wide open.