Financial Strategy
Capital allocation, value creation frameworks, DCF, EVA, and shareholder return strategies.
9 articles
TotalEnergies is flooding shareholders with cash: is the Iran war windfall a repeatable playbook?
TotalEnergies has sharply increased both its buyback programme and its dividend as oil prices surge on the back of the Iran war, generating exceptional cash flows. The case forces a precise question: when a geopolitical shock fattens your balance sheet, how much do you return and how do you structure it?
Sep 23, 2026US Treasury yields surge again: a CFO's playbook for recalibrating hurdle rates now
US Treasury yields have just posted their sharpest single-session rise since "liberation day," resetting the baseline for every capital allocation decision on your desk. This playbook walks through the specific steps CFOs need to take to recalibrate cost of capital and hurdle rates before the next investment committee meeting.
Sep 20, 2026Buffett's exit proves the conventional CFO wisdom on buybacks needs rethinking
Warren Buffett's departure as Berkshire Hathaway's chairman closes one of the most studied capital allocation careers in corporate history. The lesson most CFOs draw from it is wrong.
Aug 5, 2026Recalibrating hurdle rates when the risk-free rate is no longer free
After a decade of near-zero rates, many companies are still running investment decisions through hurdle rates built for a different era. This article unpacks how the weighted average cost of capital actually works in a structurally higher-rate environment, and what CFOs need to change in practice.
Jul 25, 2026Buybacks vs dividends: the capital return decision framework every CFO needs
Returning cash to shareholders sounds straightforward until you have to choose between a buyback and a dividend, and the wrong choice can send the wrong signal to the market at exactly the wrong moment. This article unpacks the decision framework CFOs use to make that call with precision.
Jul 22, 2026Capital allocation under pressure: how CFOs are rebuilding the investment case
Rising cost of capital and slowing organic growth are forcing CFOs to rethink how they allocate resources across portfolios that were built for a different rate environment. The CFOs who are pulling ahead are not spending more carefully, they are spending more deliberately, with tighter linkage between capital decisions and measurable value creation.
Jul 15, 2026Capital allocation under pressure: what separates CFOs who create value from those who preserve it
Most companies allocate capital the same way they did five years ago, and their returns show it. CFOs who treat the annual budgeting cycle as a strategic instrument, not an administrative ritual, are pulling measurably ahead of their peers.
Jul 8, 2026Capital allocation in an uncertain world: how CFOs are rethinking the portfolio
The old playbook of steady capital allocation anchored to long-range plans is showing its limits as volatility, rate cycles, and geopolitical fragmentation compress the window for strategic decision-making. CFOs who treat portfolio management as a continuous, granular discipline rather than an annual ritual are consistently outperforming peers on total shareholder return.
Jul 1, 2026Capital allocation in 2026: why most CFOs are still getting it wrong
Capital allocation remains the single most consequential decision a CFO makes, yet research consistently shows that most companies destroy value through poor resource deployment. Here is what separating the top performers from the rest looks like in practice.