Earnings Labs

Genuine Parts Company (GPC)

Q4 2015 Earnings Call· Tue, Feb 16, 2016

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good morning, and welcome to the Genuine Parts Company Fourth Quarter and Year-End Earnings Conference Call. Today's conference is being recorded. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. A question-and-answer session will follow the formal presentation. Now, I'd like to turn the conference over to Sid Jones, Vice President, Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Sidney G. Jones - Vice President-Investor Relations

Management

Good morning, and thank you for joining us today for the Genuine Parts Company fourth quarter 2015 conference call to discuss our earnings results and outlook for 2016. Before we begin this morning, please be advised that this call may involve forward-looking statements regarding the company and its businesses. The company's actual results could differ materially from any forward-looking statements due to several important factors described in the company's latest SEC filings. The company assumes no obligation to update any forward-looking statements made during this call. We will begin this morning with comments from Tom Gallagher, our Chairman and CEO. Tom?

Thomas C. Gallagher - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Management

Thank you, Sid, and I would like to add my welcome to each of you on the call today and to say that we appreciate you taking the time to be with us this morning. Paul Donahue, GPC's President, along with Carol Yancey, our Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer and I will each handle a portion of today's call. And once we've completed our individual comments, we'll look forward to addressing any specific questions that you may have. Earlier this morning, we released our fourth quarter and year-end results, and hopefully you've all had an opportunity to review them. But for those who may not have seen the numbers as yet, a quick recap shows sales for the quarter were $3.682 billion, which was down 4% with negative currency impact accounting for 3% of this decrease. Net income was $161.3 million, which was down 3%. Earnings per share were $1.07 this year, which was even with last year, and currency negatively impacted the EPS by $0.03 per share in the quarter. For the full year, sales were $15.280 billion, which was down four-tenths of 1%, with currency costing us 3 points of revenue growth. Net income was $706 million, which was down just under 1%, and earnings per share were $4.63 this year, compared to $4.61 in 2014. And for the full year, the currency impact was $0.14. After several years of solid performances, 2015 proved to be a more challenging year for us, largely attributable to the combination of the significant slowdown experienced in our Industrial and Electrical businesses, and the impact of unfavorable currency exchange, primarily on our Automotive business. Fortunately, as you'll hear from, Paul, in a few minutes, the underlying fundamentals remain positive for the Automotive segment, and each of our Automotive businesses are…

Paul D. Donahue - President

Management

Thank you, Tom. Good morning and welcome to our fourth quarter conference call. I'm pleased to be with you here today and to have an opportunity to provide you an update on our fourth quarter performance of our Automotive business. For the quarter ending December 31, our global Automotive sales were down 2% year-over-year. This performance consists of approximately 2.5% in core Automotive growth and a slight benefit from acquisitions. However, this was offset by a currency headwind of approximately 5% in the fourth quarter, which is consistent with the impact of currency we saw throughout 2015. Our U.S. team posted a 2% sales increase in the fourth quarter, compared with 3% growth experienced through the first nine months of 2015. Our international businesses, which include Canada, Mexico, Australia and New Zealand, reported another quarter of mid-single-digit growth in local currency. Despite challenging local economies, we remain encouraged by the steady and consistent growth we are experiencing across all of our international markets. We see no reason for this not to continue in 2016. In the U.S., our results varied by geographical region. Our business in the Northeast, Florida, Central and Western regions of the country continue to deliver solid results. The Midwest, Mountain and Southwest regions of the country all came in below our expectations. Given our strong commercial presence with fleets, including many in the battered oil and gas sector, we felt the effects across many of our stores throughout the Mountain and Southwest regions. Particularly hard-hit were stores in Texas, Oklahoma, Montana and the Dakotas. We also are seeing the effects across many of our stores in Western Canada. We would also add the above-average temperatures experienced in the fourth quarter across the Midwest and Mountain regions, negatively impacted our winter goods sales. So now let's turn…

Thomas C. Gallagher - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Management

Thank you, Carol. So that will conclude our prepared comments on 2015. And in closing, we would say as mentioned earlier, that it was a challenging year in many ways but a gratifying year in other ways. Our revenue production in local currencies was solid across our Automotive businesses as it was in Office Products, but Industrial and Electrical found it more difficult. We were pleased to see strong operating margin improvements in Automotive and Electrical, but we had operating margin declines in Office Products and Industrial. We were, however, able to show a 10-basis-point improvement for GPC overall despite the Office Products and Industrial challenges. Gross profit was down 12 basis points for the year, but good work was done on the SG&A side, and SG&A was down 20 basis points. As a result, pre-tax income was up slightly, but due to the higher tax rate that Carol explained, net income was down slightly. On the balance sheet side, the progress was more consistent, with cash from operations and free cash, both setting new records and working capital was reduced once again in 2015. And we returned well over $600 million back to shareholders through a combination of dividends and share repurchases. And we reinvested over $225 million back into the business through a combination of capital expenditures and acquisitions, and we expect to invest an additional $125 million in acquisitions over the next few months. And these CapEx and acquisition investments are intended to drive revenue and profit growth in the quarters ahead. Now, turning to the year ahead, as a general statement, we would say that we remain quite cautious in our outlook. The general economic conditions look a bit fragile and perhaps tenuous both domestically and globally. And as mentioned earlier, this is already having a significant impact on certain segments of our customer base, primarily in Industrial and Electrical. Conversely, we think that the outlook for our Automotive segment is generally favorable, but the currency impact will once again be a headwind to our Automotive growth in 2015. With all of that said, at this point, we would expect our 2016 revenues to be up 2% to 3% in Automotive with a currency headwind of 3%; Industrial, up 1% to 2%; Electrical, up 1% to 2%; Office Products, down 1% to up 1%; giving us a total GPC revenue expectation of being up 1% to 2% and up 3% to 4% before the currency impact. And with revenue growth at these levels, we would suggest an EPS range of $4.70 to $4.80, which will be up 1.5% to 3.5% after currency exchange impact of approximately $0.08 per share, and before the currency exchange impact, would be up 3% to 5% on a constant currency basis. At this point, we'd like to address your questions, and we'll turn the call back to Chris.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. And we will take our first question from Elizabeth Suzuki of Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

Elizabeth Lane Suzuki - Bank of America Merrill Lynch

Analyst

Good morning. Just wondering how much of the SG&A leverage in the fourth quarter was the result of lower stock compensation? And what other cost reductions were made in order to generate the impressive operating margins in the quarter? Carol B. Yancey - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: Elizabeth, we would talk about that. I guess I would say primarily it's more coming in the areas of productivity improvements, and we've talked a lot about the investments we've made in technology and productivity things, and that would be both on our warehouses and our stores. Also I would point out additional leverage in our shared services and areas we're doing there. Even in our freight, we look at freight and optimization of our routes, fuel prices, we had improvement there. And then even bringing on some of the acquisitions. We're able to bring them on and put them on what we call the GPC programs, and we get the benefit of better pricing for those folks. So to a lesser extent, you'd have the impact of lower bonuses and commissions, and then kind of a tightening up that we do, like on travel and some areas such as that.

Elizabeth Lane Suzuki - Bank of America Merrill Lynch

Analyst

Okay, great. So stock comp wasn't really a material benefit? Carol B. Yancey - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: It's really a combination of all those things. That was certainly not the primary. It's more in the productivity and some of the things that we're doing in improving our cost overall.

Elizabeth Lane Suzuki - Bank of America Merrill Lynch

Analyst

Okay, great. And for the Automotive segment, you noted that there was a weather impact in the fourth quarter since it was relatively warm through December. Do you think that should reverse in the first quarter, so that the average of 4Q and 1Q would be about the same year-over-year from a weather perspective?

Paul D. Donahue - President

Management

Yeah. Elizabeth, this is Paul. We'd certainly hope to see it. What we're seeing in the early part of the year is encouraging. And certainly the folks up in the Northeast, Boston, New York are feeling the impact of colder temps returning, and we're seeing a bit of it in the Midwest as well. So, absolutely, we are encouraged with some of the weather changes we're seeing.

Elizabeth Lane Suzuki - Bank of America Merrill Lynch

Analyst

Okay. Thank you.

Paul D. Donahue - President

Management

You're welcome. Carol B. Yancey - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: Thank you.

Operator

Operator

We go next to Seth Basham of Wedbush Securities.

Seth M. Basham - Wedbush Securities, Inc.

Analyst

Good morning.

Thomas C. Gallagher - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Management

Hey, Seth.

Paul D. Donahue - President

Management

Good morning, Seth. Carol B. Yancey - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: Good morning.

Seth M. Basham - Wedbush Securities, Inc.

Analyst

My first question is on auto, just trying to understand a little bit better your expectations for 2016. You're looking for a growth of 2% to 3% on revenues, with a 3% FX headwind. So looking for core growth in the mid-single digit range, is that correct?

Thomas C. Gallagher - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Management

That's right.

Seth M. Basham - Wedbush Securities, Inc.

Analyst

Okay. In terms of the drivers of that core growth, weather might normalize a little bit, but are there any other initiatives that you can speak to that could help improve your business in 2016 relative to 2015?

Thomas C. Gallagher - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Management

Well, Paul and I might double team this. But in his comments, he highlighted several things that we think are going to give us some good production in the year ahead. He talked about the top store initiative, and we'll add 150 of those this coming year and that will certainly be a benefit to us. So we've got other new distribution initiatives that will also help us. Paul mentioned some of the growth we're experiencing with NAPA AutoCare and with Major Accounts; we would expect that to continue in the year ahead. Our import program is performing well and we did add Olympus, the recent acquisition, so that will fuel growth there. So just a number of different things that we expect to have a positive impact as we go ahead.

Paul D. Donahue - President

Management

Yeah. I would add to that, Tom. We – Seth, we'll continue to be opportunistic and fairly aggressive on the acquisition front, both in the U.S. as well as international as evident by our Covs acquisition. We do hope to close that here very soon in Australia. And we continue to expand our presence in Mexico as well, and, as you know, we launched our NAPA initiative down there in late 2014. It's early yet, but we remain encouraged by what we see in those markets as well.

Seth M. Basham - Wedbush Securities, Inc.

Analyst

Got it. Just to quantify it, approximately how much do you expect acquisitions to contribute to auto revenues in 2016?

Thomas C. Gallagher - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Management

The only one we've included in our guidance is Olympus. And just as a general statement, we normally will not include anything that we've not got a very, very high degree of confidence. And we've got a letter of intent and we've got a closing date, so we included Olympus. On the Industrial side, we included the two acquisitions that will close on March 1. But beyond that, we've not included any of the others in the guidance that we've given you.

Seth M. Basham - Wedbush Securities, Inc.

Analyst

Got it, thank you. And then my second question, really good performance on cash flow in 2015. As you look forward, it seems like you're expecting much higher at least percentage increase in CapEx and may not see as much payables leverage. Can you help us understand those two moving pieces to your cash flow expectations? Carol B. Yancey - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: Yeah. Talk about CapEx first. I mean, some of the CapEx, and you saw that we were lower than what our guidance was for 2015, some of that is the timing of projects. But I would specifically call out, we have a couple distribution center refreshes, relocations where we're enhancing again the productivity. And so that's built into there. And then some of our IT investments that we've talked about, and certainly in the warehouse management area. But again, some of it is the timing on projects. But we're certainly comfortable with the range we've given. And then you mentioned on the improvements for cash flow, I mean, one of our sources of cash from operations was in the decrease in accounts receivable. We had almost a $200 million source from accounts receivable, more related to our decrease in sales. So that's why we're guiding to a little bit lower number because we think that receivables won't be as much of a help to us in 2016.

Seth M. Basham - Wedbush Securities, Inc.

Analyst

Got it. Thank you very much and good luck.

Thomas C. Gallagher - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Management

Thanks, Seth.

Paul D. Donahue - President

Management

Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Greg Melich of Evercore ISI.

Greg Melich - Evercore ISI

Analyst

Thanks. I had a quick follow-up for Carol, and then I wanted to ask Paul and Tom a couple, one thing. Carol, on the working capital, the AP-to-inventory ratio also improved a lot. Was there something there in timing, or do you think that could get to 100% from I guess what's now a little over 90%? Carol B. Yancey - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: Yeah. We were pleased to see that be at 94% at the end of the year, and as you mentioned, improvements from the 84% the prior year. We don't have a set target for 2016, but I would tell you that we certainly would expect continued improvement. And there wasn't anything that drove that in particular in the fourth quarter. We continue to see improvement across all of our businesses. And that was really done despite lower inventory purchases in the Industrial sector, too

Greg Melich - Evercore ISI

Analyst

Good. So that still has room to go, it sounds like? Carol B. Yancey - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: It does.

Greg Melich - Evercore ISI

Analyst

Great. And then I'm not sure, Paul or Tom, who wants it, but if you think about this year and the guidance and some of the history of weather, if I go back to 2012, which I think is the last time we had a winter that was kind of mild to start, your comps decelerate, I think, maybe 400 basis points over a couple of quarters. Help us understand why this time could be different, or why we expect that auto should hold in there for the next couple of quarters? And I also wanted to make sure, Tom, you said Industrial would be up 1% to 2% this year. What accounts for that inflection from at least the second half of 2015's trend? Thanks a lot.

Thomas C. Gallagher - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Management

Okay. We'll take the Automotive first. I think we're basing our guidance more on some of the underlying strategies than we are on any weather impact. And the issues that – or the initiatives that Paul and I detailed just a moment ago, I think, are the primary reasons that we've guided to the levels we've guided at. So I think we're pretty comfortable at those levels as we work our way through 2016. In terms of the inflection in Industrial, there are two things. Again, the comment I made about we'll be adding $50 million of annualized revenue as of March 1 with the two acquisitions that we're making, that's one thing. And then the second thing, it's – six weeks does not a trend make by any stretch. But what we saw on a per day basis in January and what we've seen through mid-month February is a little bit better than what we experienced certainly in Q4 of this past year. And the other thing is not included in the guidance would be an expectation that we might be able to make another acquisition or two over the course of the year in Industrial.

Greg Melich - Evercore ISI

Analyst

Great. And that bit better on a per-day basis, was that more in the oil and gas and some of the areas that have been weak? Or is it already there? Has it already been positively improved?

Thomas C. Gallagher - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Management

No, I think it's more across those segments that have held up reasonably well.

Greg Melich - Evercore ISI

Analyst

Great. Thanks a lot. Good luck.

Thomas C. Gallagher - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Management

Right. Thank you.

Paul D. Donahue - President

Management

Thank you. Carol B. Yancey - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: Thanks, Greg.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Matthew Fassler of Goldman Sachs. Matthew J. Fassler - Goldman Sachs & Co.: Thanks a lot and good morning. My first question relates to capital allocation, and you're use of free cash. I think I detected a change at least in the rhetoric and prioritization. Historically you've always cited the dividend first, and today you cited strategic acquisitions and went into some depth in that. So is that my imagination, or is there some intent? Obviously, you've been raising the dividend for many, many decades, and that I know is not expected to change, but does that speak to an increased focus on strategic deals for you?

Thomas C. Gallagher - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Management

Well, I don't know that it necessarily signals an increased focus, but there's a heavy emphasis and focus on strategic acquisitions right now, and we've actually got more discussions going than we had at certain points in the past. So, we're encouraged by the number of conversations that we're engaged in, and we would expect a certain number of those to come to fruition. And quite frankly, I think if we had 2015 to play over, we might have been even more aggressive on the acquisition front, but we just didn't find – we're unable to engage in enough discussions. But I think we've gotten that sorted out, and we're pleased with the level of activity we see there right now. So I don't think it at all indicates reduced interest in increasing the dividend, lower reduced interest in appropriate levels of share repurchase or CapEx expenditures across the businesses, but we're bit more optimistic about our opportunities on the acquisition right now than it might have been this time last year. Matthew J. Fassler - Goldman Sachs & Co.: And Tom, would you expect most of your deals to be of similar size to the kinds of transactions that we have noted over the past several years in terms of general range?

Thomas C. Gallagher - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Management

Yes. I would say that's right. However, as Carol mentioned, if we would have find something larger that made sense for the shareholders then we would certainly like the opportunity to engage in that discussion. And the nice thing about our balance sheet is that we've got the wherewithal to fund acquisitions that are larger. Matthew J. Fassler - Goldman Sachs & Co.: Got it. And then shifting gears, just digging a little bit deeper into the Automotive P&L, you had quite a move in the profitability of that business in the absence of any kind of sales momentum. I understand that last year's margin compare in Automotive was somewhat depressed, so that might help the year-on-year compare, but can you just give us a little more color on what helped you generate that Automotive profitability? Carol B. Yancey - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: Yeah. I would call out – so in the quarter, I would say that of the 110 basis point improvement, a third of that came from gross margin and two-thirds was from SG&A. So our core gross profit and we've called this out before, we've seen continued quarterly improvement in our core gross profits for Automotive. And that's both in the U.S. and our international businesses and there has been specific things done in our foreign businesses to really take control of gross profit, especially with the headwinds that they've had on the strong U.S. dollar. And then two-thirds of the improvement came from SG&A, and it's some of the things that we called out earlier. So, again, Automotive has done a terrific job on the productivity side. And again, calling out some specific things they've done with investments in technology and systems and the warehouses and the stores. And then also, again, the freight, we've talked about route optimizations in some of those areas. And then, to a lesser extent, you had lower bonuses and incentives that impacted that in the quarter as well. Matthew J. Fassler - Goldman Sachs & Co.: And were there reversals of any accruals in that business of year-to-date numbers that perhaps went the other way in Q4? Carol B. Yancey - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: There weren't anything else that we haven't already called out. Matthew J. Fassler - Goldman Sachs & Co.: Got it. Thank you very much. Carol B. Yancey - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: Thank you.

Thomas C. Gallagher - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Management

Thanks, Matthew.

Operator

Operator

From JPMorgan, next we turn to Mark Becks.

Mark A. Becks - JPMorgan Securities LLC

Analyst

Hi. The sales outlook of plus 1% to 2% in earnings, that seems to imply kind of flat to up slightly EBIT margins. Is that, in fact, accurate? And then, how does that parse out between Automotive and Industrial? Presumably Automotive would be expected to be up a little, and then on the other side Industrial, I guess, would be expected to be down slightly? Is that the way to think about it? Carol B. Yancey - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: Mark, I guess, we are probably implying – what we would imply is that we'd have some slight improvement in our operating margins. And I think what you called out is we would expect probably to see that, depending on the top line, more in the other sectors than the Industrial ones. But we're more implying for a slight improvement on the operating margin. I mean, we've called out we still have our corporate expense numbers a little higher. But again, I think we can be up slightly with what we're targeting.

Mark A. Becks - JPMorgan Securities LLC

Analyst

Okay. And then, I guess, the other side of the ledger with Matt's question, you guys have been steadfastly committed to the dividend. I think you have a targeted payout ratio of 50% to 55%. And with your dividend announcement today it takes you slightly outside. Given your proven ability with strong cash flows, why is the 50% to 55% the right number? And then would you have any considerations for taking that up?

Thomas C. Gallagher - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Management

I'll try to answer that, Mark. This is Tom. First of all, the 50% to 55% is somewhat of an informal stated objective, and over time, we've come to conclude that a payout at that level is a reward and return back to the shareholder, while at the same time leaving us adequate funding to do the other things that we want to get done. So, yes, we're slightly above that. I think we're 57% of prior-year earnings with the recent dividend increase. I don't think you'll see us take that up materially from there. I think we'll take that, the capital that we're generating, the cash we're generating and invest it in some of these other areas.

Mark A. Becks - JPMorgan Securities LLC

Analyst

Understood. And then last quick clarification for Carol. You have that $250 million in November due. Any initial thoughts on that? Carol B. Yancey - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: It's still premature, but our thoughts on that, is that we'll probably do some type of a renewal as we get close to the end of the year.

Mark A. Becks - JPMorgan Securities LLC

Analyst

Okay. Great. Thank you.

Thomas C. Gallagher - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Management

Thank you. Carol B. Yancey - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Up next, we go to Bret Jordan of Jefferies.

Bret Jordan - Jefferies LLC

Analyst

Hey, good morning.

Paul D. Donahue - President

Management

Hey. Carol B. Yancey - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: Good morning.

Thomas C. Gallagher - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Management

Good morning, Bret.

Bret Jordan - Jefferies LLC

Analyst

A quick question on the top store rollout, you're adding 150. If that were successful, how many of your stores do you think are applicable here? I mean, how big could that concept get?

Paul D. Donahue - President

Management

So, Bret, we're planning on 150 this year of our company-owned stores. We could go a bit greater in that number. We're going to see kind of how the first half plays out. When we've got stores that are in not exactly prime retail locations, so backstreets, more Industrial areas, we will certainly refresh those stores, but we will not go to the full top-store formats. But right now, we feel very good about our ability to roll out the 150, could expand it. We will also – any new stores and/or any new relocations this year, we will move to the new store format. And then at the appropriate time, we'll also bring in our independent owners who are ready to make that kind of a commitment as well.

Bret Jordan - Jefferies LLC

Analyst

Okay. And then a question on Olympus. I mean, it's a $25 million revenue business. Is that something that you're getting a catalog you can roll out across the rest of the network that it will contribute in that import parts category more quickly? Or is that just something you're going to grow off of a relatively small base more slowly?

Paul D. Donahue - President

Management

So, Bret, we are already and have had an import business inside of the NAPA network for a number of years that's Altrom. So we've been in that space. Olympus will be a nice bolt-on addition to that business, and we'll certainly bring with it increased expertise. They've got a great management team, an experienced management team. We've got expansion opportunities up there in that marketplace, but we're excited to bring those guys on board.

Bret Jordan - Jefferies LLC

Analyst

Okay, but there was nothing special about their catalog that you acquired that is leverageable?

Paul D. Donahue - President

Management

No. No. No.

Bret Jordan - Jefferies LLC

Analyst

Okay. Great. Thank you.

Paul D. Donahue - President

Management

All right. You're welcome.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Tony Cristello of BB&T Capital Markets. Anthony F. Cristello - BB&T Capital Markets: Thank you. Good morning.

Thomas C. Gallagher - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Management

Good morning, Tony. Carol B. Yancey - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: Morning. Anthony F. Cristello - BB&T Capital Markets: I wanted to ask a follow-up on some of the discussion with M&A. It sounds as if there is certainly an acceleration, and perhaps you had an appetite to maybe even have done more in 2015. Is that a result of more willing sellers or multiples have come in? Or are there some distressed businesses out there that you feel like you can pick up and gain some market share from right now?

Thomas C. Gallagher - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Management

Tony, I think it's more of the former two than the last point. We're not really bottom-fishing. We're not looking for distressed businesses. We're looking for businesses that give us an opportunity to expand geographically, or give us product diversification, and that fit us strategically for the long haul. I think, as I mentioned earlier to a prior question, I think we're just seeing right now the opportunity to at least engage in more discussions with certain sellers than perhaps we had seen a year ago. And certainly we're interested in following not just the discussions we're in now through to completion, but also identifying some additional opportunities that we could add to the organization. Anthony F. Cristello - BB&T Capital Markets: Has the marketplace afforded more reasonable valuations for you as well?

Thomas C. Gallagher - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Management

Well, yeah, and I think you probably know at least we consider ourselves to be a fairly disciplined buyer, and there have been times in the past where we've engaged in discussions and we couldn't chin to the valuations and feel it was appropriate for our shareholders. But right now, we seem to have a number of folks that fit in the ranges that we would use for valuation purposes. Anthony F. Cristello - BB&T Capital Markets: Okay. And switching gears a little bit, if you look across your competitive landscape and each of your segments, you've done an excellent job of keeping your inventory appropriate. Do you feel your competitors are also reacting accordingly to what appears to be at least in the non-auto segments a bit more of a sluggish or challenging environment?

Thomas C. Gallagher - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Management

Tony, if we could – something happened where you broke up a little bit there. Would you mind repeating the question? Anthony F. Cristello - BB&T Capital Markets: Sure, I'm sorry. Across the categories, I was wondering from a competitive standpoint, you've done a very good job on managing your inventory levels and keeping things somewhat appropriate. When you look across some of your competitive segments, and more so in the Industrial side, do you believe your peers are also reacting accordingly?

Thomas C. Gallagher - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Management

Well, I don't know that I'd be in a position to address that honestly. The thing that I would say is that having the right amount of inventory and the right mix of inventory is a high priority for us across all of the businesses. And I think it's played out reasonably well for us and I expect that it'll be a heavy initiative for us going forward as well. I can't address what the competitors are doing. Anthony F. Cristello - BB&T Capital Markets: Okay. Okay. Very good. Thank you for your time.

Thomas C. Gallagher - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Management

Thank you, Tony.

Paul D. Donahue - President

Management

Thank you Carol B. Yancey - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Our next question comes from Scot Ciccarelli of RBC Capital Markets.

Scot Ciccarelli - RBC Capital Markets LLC

Analyst

Good morning, guys.

Paul D. Donahue - President

Management

Good morning, Scot.

Scot Ciccarelli - RBC Capital Markets LLC

Analyst

Good morning. So I know you don't break out CapEx by division, but even as I look at the entire company, your CapEx is somewhere between a half and a quarter of your biggest Automotive competitors. And I know your model is, obviously, a bit different with the wholesale component, but I guess the question is do you believe those levels of CapEx are sustainable, number one? And number two, it does appear that some of those competitors are actually accelerating their own capital investments. So I guess in a nutshell the question is, do you think you're going to need to accelerate your capital investments at some point?

Thomas C. Gallagher - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Management

I would take a first stab at that and Carol may jump in. But in the guidance that Carol provided, she said $140 million to $160 million in 2016, which is up a bit from where we have been historically. And I think for modeling purposes, you could probably use that for the years after 2016. So it is a little bit heavier. We're investing a bit heavier. And as Carol mentioned, it's for facility refreshments to enable us to be more productive in the throughput. It's for technology investments that enable us to either have better management information or enable us to be more productive in what we do. And at least as we look out over the next couple of years, it appears that that's an appropriate level for the next several years. Carol B. Yancey - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: I guess, I think the only other two things I'd add is one is our maintenance level of CapEx, if you will, the amount we need to do each year is probably more in the $100 million range. And the other thing is we have our distribution footprint out there. I mean, we're really in all the areas we need to be. So, if anything, it's – we have a lighter level of investments on real estate. So more of ours is in the technology, productivity areas with systems. And so if we have investments in real estate, it's more due to a relocation or refresh.

Scot Ciccarelli - RBC Capital Markets LLC

Analyst

Got you. Okay, that's helpful. And then you guys did talk about there's quite a bit of regional variability in the auto business, obviously weather had an impact. I'm assuming part of that is also the, let's call it, stores in the oil patch or energy patch. Can you give us some more color around the magnitude of the differences experienced market by market?

Paul D. Donahue - President

Management

Yes. Scot, this is Paul. What we saw in those markets that performed well, and I think I called out the East, certainly the Northeast, Florida, Central, out West, those businesses in Q4 all grew mid-single digits, good solid growth. The other end of the spectrum, and I believe I called out the Southwest and the Mountains, certainly impacted by oil and gas and Midwest, which we believe was more weather-related, were down low-single digits.

Scot Ciccarelli - RBC Capital Markets LLC

Analyst

Perfect. All right. Thanks, guys.

Thomas C. Gallagher - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Management

All right. Thanks, Scot. Carol B. Yancey - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: Thank you.

Operator

Operator

We'll take our next question from Carolina Jolly of Gabelli. A. Carolina Jolly - Gabelli & Co.: Thanks, guys, for taking my question. Carol B. Yancey - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: Good morning. A. Carolina Jolly - Gabelli & Co.: Good morning. In regards to the Industrial side of the business or Motion, what is your sense of inventory at your customers? And do you expect, I guess, any destocking going forward into 2016?

Thomas C. Gallagher - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Management

Carolina, I'll try to answer that one. Most of what we sell on the Industrial side is not for customer inventory. It's for something that they need right now. So inventory fluctuations are not that big of a factor for us honestly. So what we do see is we do have some customers that would hold some inventory. And if they're a multi-location customer, we do see them employing what we might call a buy – or use what we own already. So we do see some inventory transfer among plants under the same ownership, but I don't think inventory fluctuations are going to have a material effect on our demand patterns over the next year. A. Carolina Jolly - Gabelli & Co.: Great. Thanks.

Thomas C. Gallagher - Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Management

Thank you.

Operator

Operator

And with no further questions in the phone queue, I'd like to turn the conference back over to management for any additional or closing remarks. Carol B. Yancey - Chief Financial Officer & Executive Vice President: We thank all of you for participating in today's call, and we appreciate all of your support, and we look forward to reporting out to you with our first quarter results in April. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

And this does conclude today's presentation. Thank you all for your participation.