Free cash flow remains consistently negative, with quarterly outflows frequently exceeding $20 million, further exacerbated by stock-based compensation reaching as high as $8.8 million in 2025Q3.
LanzaTech Global, Inc. (LNZA) cash flow statement — 6-year operating, investing & financing cash flows
| Metric | TTM | Dec'25 | Dec'24 | Dec'23 | Dec'22 | Dec'21 | Dec'20 |
|---|
| Cash from Operations | -32.7M | -64.85M | -89.06M | -97.3M | -84.7M | -42.59M | -39.27M |
| Operating CF Margin % | - | -116.13% | -179.59% | -155.35% | -226.82% | -167.28% | -213.98% |
| Operating CF Growth % | 258.32% | 27.18% | 8.46% | -14.87% | -98.88% | -8.45% | - |
| Net Income | 172.4M | -48.95M | -137.73M | -134.1M | -1.36M | -46.69M | -37.71M |
| Depreciation & Amortization | 4.29M | 4.23M | 5.59M | 5.45M | 4.66M | 3.81M | 2.98M |
| Stock-Based Compensation | 10.81M | 7.2M | 13.21M | 15.2M | 2.53M | 2.53M | 2.39M |
| Deferred Taxes | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | -7.19M | -4.42M | -1.4M |
| Other Non-Cash Items | -176.62M | -49.18M | 21.73M | 32.03M | -89.8M | -343K | 547K |
| Working Capital Changes | 10.44M | 21.85M | 8.14M | -15.88M | 6.45M | 2.52M | -6.08M |
| Change in Receivables | 1.57M | 10.68M | 9.72M | 104K | -15.06M | 2.67M | -4.47M |
| Change in Inventory | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 15.06M | -85.53K | 0 |
| Change in Payables | -1.33M | 5.12M | -1.79M | -4.99M | 2.41M | 85.53K | 0 |
| Cash from Investing | -4.11M | 11.15M | 28.35M | -57.91M | -10.69M | -5.75M | -6.59M |
| Capital Expenditures | -1.11M | -1.26M | -5.31M | -8.55M | -10.73M | -5.75M | -7.11M |
| CapEx % of Revenue | 1.9% | 2.25% | 10.71% | 13.66% | 28.75% | 22.59% | 38.74% |
| Acquisitions | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 49K | 0 | 0 |
| Investments | - | - | - | - | - | - | - |
| Other Investing | 0 | 0 | 25K | 44.5M | 40K | 150M | 517K |
| Cash from Financing | -117.62M | 25.62M | 30.21M | 148.19M | 50.55M | 116.02M | 44.73M |
| Debt Issued (Net) | 0 | -12.5M | 40M | 0 | 0 | -570K | -1.81M |
| Equity Issued (Net) | 50M | 15.05M | -48K | -7.65M | 545K | 150.85M | 0 |
| Dividends Paid | -722.16M | 0 | 0 | -722.16M | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Share Repurchases | 0 | 0 | -48K | -7.65M | -649K | 0 | 0 |
| Other Financing | 554.54M | 23.07M | -9.74M | 878M | 50M | -34.27M | 46.54M |
| Net Change in Cash | 9.26M | -28.69M | -30.55M | -7.43M | -45.02M | 67.82M | -1.21M |
| Free Cash Flow | -33.8M | -66.11M | -94.37M | -105.85M | -95.44M | -48.34M | -46.38M |
| FCF Margin % | -57.97% | -118.38% | -190.3% | -169% | -255.57% | -189.87% | -252.72% |
| FCF Growth % | 63.2% | 29.95% | 10.84% | -10.91% | -97.42% | -4.23% | - |
| FCF per Share | -14.57 | -28.49 | -47.76 | -60.13 | -1025.99 | -257.83 | -28.46 |
| FCF Conversion (FCF/Net Income) | -0.20x | 1.32x | 0.65x | 0.73x | 1.11x | 0.91x | 1.04x |
| Interest Paid | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Taxes Paid | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Quick answers to the most common questions about buying LNZA stock.
LanzaTech Global, Inc. (LNZA) generated $-64.9M in net cash from operating activities in 2025. This reflects the cash generated directly from core business operations.
LanzaTech Global, Inc. (LNZA) reported negative free cash flow of $66.1M in 2025, indicating capital requirements exceeded cash from operations.
LanzaTech Global, Inc. (LNZA) spent $1.3M on capital expenditures in 2025. CapEx represents the cash invested in physical assets like property, plant, and equipment to maintain or grow the business.
Key Metrics
Top Statement Risk
Liquidity and Dilution Risk
Metrics are mathematically derived from official filings.
Earnings Quality Remains Highly Disconnected
According to the provided cash flow data, the relationship between net income and operating cash flow is frequently decoupled, with OCF/NI ratios fluctuating wildly, such as the 73.36 observed in 2025Q4, indicating that reported earnings provide little insight into the firm's actual cash-generating capacity.
The extreme volatility in the OCF/NI ratio suggests that non-cash items and significant working capital swings are the primary drivers of the bottom line rather than core operational performance. Investors should monitor this divergence, as it implies that the company's accounting earnings are not currently representative of its underlying cash burn profile.
Persistent Negative Free Cash Flow
As reported in financial statements, LanzaTech's free cash flow trajectory remains consistently negative, with quarterly outflows frequently exceeding $20 million, underscoring the structural inability of the current business model to self-fund its ongoing research and development requirements without external capital injections.
The persistent negative FCF margins, which have reached as low as -178.1%, highlight a business model that is currently consuming rather than creating value. This trend suggests that the company remains in a high-intensity investment phase where cash outflows are decoupled from revenue growth, necessitating a cautious outlook on liquidity.
Working Capital Volatility Masks Burn
Based on the reported figures, working capital changes have been highly erratic, swinging from a $11.3 million inflow in 2024Q2 to a $6.6 million outflow in 2024Q1, which suggests that the timing of project-based milestones significantly distorts the company's short-term liquidity position.
These large swings in working capital appear to be a byproduct of the company's reliance on milestone-based revenue recognition, which creates lumpy cash inflows. This volatility makes it difficult to assess the underlying efficiency of the company's collection cycles and payables management, warranting further investigation into the durability of these cash flows.
Capital Allocation Prioritizes Non-Operational Outflows
As evidenced by the financial data, the company has engaged in significant capital deployment activities, including massive dividend payments of $722.2 million in multiple quarters, which appears highly incongruent with the firm's ongoing operational cash burn and limited cash reserves.
The scale of these dividend payments relative to the company's negative operating cash flow suggests a complex capital structure that may be obscuring the true cost of maintaining the business. Investors should scrutinize these outflows, as they appear to be a significant drain on resources that could otherwise be used to fund the company's core technology scaling.
SBC and Non-Cash Items Obfuscation
Based on the provided data, stock-based compensation and other non-cash adjustments frequently impact the cash flow statement, with SBC reaching as high as $8.8 million in 2025Q3, which serves to mask the true economic cost of talent acquisition in a competitive synthetic biology market.
The reliance on stock-based compensation as a primary tool for managing operating expenses suggests that the company is attempting to preserve cash at the expense of shareholder dilution. This practice warrants careful monitoring, as it may hide the true magnitude of the company's operational losses from a cash-basis perspective.