Free Cash Flow (FCF)was adopted in the late 1980s as a financial tool to
evaluate the firm and its individual projects.We question the procedure
of calculating the FCFwhere a significant portion of Current Liabilities is
offset against Current Assets, thereby creating the hybrid asset Net
Working Capital (NWC). Borrowed from accounting methodology,
that procedure distorts the FCF size, composition, volatility, and estimated
value. Our empirical analysis shows that the nature and extent of
those distortions can misinform the firm's stockholders, lenders and
borrowers, and investors at large. We propose a revised FCF that
would avoid those distortions