How the Mega-Cap Workbook Works
The workbook above runs a reverse DCF on eleven of the largest companies in the world: NVIDIA, Alphabet, Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, TSMC, Broadcom, SpaceX, Meta, Tesla, and Oracle. A normal discounted cash flow model starts with a growth forecast and produces a fair value. A reverse DCF starts with today’s price and solves for the growth required to earn it. The output is a requirement, not a prediction: the free cash flow these companies must generate, year by year, for current prices to equal present value.
The model pins 2026 and 2027 to Wall Street consensus estimates, including the capex guidance the companies themselves have published, then solves for the growth rate the years after must deliver. At default assumptions (10% discount rate, 2.5% terminal growth), the combined requirement works out to roughly $4.5 trillion of annual free cash flow by 2036, against about $935 billion of operating cash flow today.
Every input is editable: the discount rate, terminal growth, growth and fade years, the treatment of stock-based compensation, and every line of the underlying data table. Change anything and the entire workbook reprices instantly.
What Each Section Does
The Result solves for the headline number: the annual free cash flow growth rate today’s prices require across the group.
Company X-Rays run the same solve one company at a time, so you can see which names carry modest requirements and which carry steep ones.
The Bull Case, Company by Company presents the strongest honest case for each name, no strawmen, alongside the terminal free cash flow its price implies.
The Claims Ledger is the aggregation test. Each bull case claims a slice of a real end market: cloud infrastructure, digital advertising, enterprise software, consumer devices, e-commerce, AI applications, and semiconductors. The ledger sizes each market’s bull-case 2036 revenue, converts it to a maximum free-cash-flow pool at a stated margin, and checks whether the combined claims fit. At default settings, three markets are claimed at well over 100% of their pool.
The CapEx Dial simulates the circularity inside the group. A large share of NVIDIA’s, Broadcom’s, and TSMC’s revenue is the hyperscalers’ capital spending. Cut any buyer’s capex and watch the sellers’ revenue fall; raise it and watch the buyers’ free cash flow fall. The two sides of the complex are connected by the same dollars.
The Planet Test measures the aggregate requirement against the size of the entire global profit pool, in today’s dollars.
Key Terms
Free cash flow (FCF): operating cash flow minus capital expenditures. The cash a business generates after funding its own operations and investment.
Implied growth rate: the annual FCF growth a stock price requires for the price to equal the present value of future cash flows at your discount rate.
Terminal value: the value assigned to all cash flows beyond the model’s horizon, here calculated with 2.5% perpetual growth after 2036.
WACC / discount rate: the annual return you require for taking equity risk. The requirement is highly sensitive to this input; one percentage point moves it substantially in either direction.
What This Workbook Is Not
It is not a forecast, a price target, or a recommendation to buy or sell anything. It does not say which company falls short. It measures how much success the system as a whole requires and lets you judge whether your own assumptions support it. Several of these companies are exceptional businesses by any historical standard; the workbook’s question is what their prices already assume.
Frequently Asked Questions
Where does the data come from? Financial figures are trailing-twelve-month results from company filings, with forward estimates approximating Wall Street consensus and company capex guidance. The current snapshot is dated June 10, 2026. Every figure is editable in The Data table if you have a better number.
Why do some companies show “n/m” for implied growth? Oracle, SpaceX, and Amazon have zero or negative free cash flow on the relevant basis, and no growth rate can be solved from a non-positive base. Their bull-case cards still state the terminal cash flow their prices imply, solved directly.
Doesn’t heavy capex today mean higher cash flow later? That is the bull case, and the model grants it: capex intensity is assumed to fade from roughly 33% of revenue back to the pre-AI norm of about 11%, and margins are assumed to expand to your steady-state setting. The required growth figures already include both assumptions.
Is the market overvalued? The workbook doesn’t answer that. It converts prices into requirements and shows you the requirements. Whether $4.5 trillion of annual free cash flow by 2036 is achievable is a judgment the tool leaves to you, with every assumption exposed.
How is this different from a P/E ratio? A multiple compares price to one year of earnings. A reverse DCF accounts for the timing of cash flows, the near-term capex cycle, dilution from stock-based compensation, and the value of everything beyond the horizon. It answers a more specific question: not “is this expensive,” but “what exactly has to happen.”
This workbook is for educational purposes only and is not investment, legal, or tax advice. Figures are estimates and may contain errors; markets reprice continuously. Consult a qualified professional before making investment decisions.