A machine costs $10 million today and lasts ten years. Instead of booking the whole cost at once, the company spreads it: $1 million each year. That is depreciation — an expense against profit, but no money leaving the building.
MoatLens tip: This is precisely why cash flow usually exceeds profit. That is normal, not a trick. It becomes suspicious when a company waves depreciation away as "non-cash" and acts as if the machine lasts forever. It does not. One day it must be replaced, and then money most certainly flows.
In MoatLens this explanation sits right next to the number — one tap away. And you see the ten-year trend instead of a single value.
