Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by. Welcome to The TJX Companies' Fourth Quarter Fiscal 2016 Financial Results Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. Later, we will conduct a question-and-answer session. As a reminder, this conference call is being recorded, February 24, 2016. I would like to turn the conference call over to Mr. Ernie Hermann, Chief Executive Officer and President of The TJX Companies, Inc. Please go ahead, sir. Ernie L. Herrman - Chief Executive Officer, President & Director: Thanks, Gabby. Before we begin, Deb has some opening comments.

Good morning. The forward-looking statements we'll make today about the company's results and plans are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause the actual results and the implementation of the company's plans to vary materially. These risks are discussed in the company's SEC filings, including, without limitation, the Form 10-K filed March 31, 2015. Further, these comments and the Q&A that follows are copyrighted today by The TJX Companies. Any recording, retransmission, reproduction or other use of the same for profit or otherwise without prior consent of TJX is prohibited and a violation of United States copyright and other laws. Additionally, while we have approved the publishing of a transcript of this call by a third party, we take no responsibility for inaccuracies that may appear in that transcript. Please note that the financial results and expectations we'll discuss today are on a continuing operations basis. Also, we have detailed the impact of foreign exchange on our consolidated results in our international divisions in today's press release in the Investor Information section of our website, tjx.com. Reconciliations of the non-GAAP measures we'll discuss today to GAAP measures are included in today's press release or otherwise posted on our website, tjx.com, in the Investor Information section. Thank you. And now, I'll turn it back over to Ernie. Ernie L. Herrman - Chief Executive Officer, President & Director: Good morning. Joining me and Deb on the call are Carol Meyrowitz and Scott Goldenberg. Before I begin, I'd like to take this opportunity on behalf of myself, our entire management team and our organization to express our sincerest gratitude to Carol. For nine years as CEO and over a long tenure with the company, Carol has led TJX to great success with achievements too numerous to cover on this call. I am delighted that, in her new role as Executive Chairman, Carol and I will continue our 20-plus years of working together. Thank you, Carol.

Thank you. Ernie L. Herrman - Chief Executive Officer, President & Director: I'd like to start by saying that 2015 was another terrific year for TJX. We surpassed $30 billion in sales, and consolidated comp sales increased a strong 5%, which is well above our plan. We are extremely pleased that the comp was driven entirely by customer traffic. Consumers are loving our stores and shopping as even more frequently. We are convinced we are gaining market share profitably around the world. On an adjusted basis, earnings per share increased 5%, also above our expectations and over a strong 12% increase the prior year. 2015 marks the 20th consecutive year of comp and EPS gains for TJX. In our 39-year history, we have seen only one comp store sales decline. We're also very pleased that we drove merchandise margin increases while offering even more amazing values to our customers. It's important to note that we achieved these results despite significant foreign currency headwinds, as well as reinvesting in the business. Further, we were thrilled that our momentum continued into the fourth quarter. We ended the year with fourth quarter results that significantly exceeded our plans. It's also great to see such consistency in our business with comps hitting 5% to 6% every quarter of the year. Our 2015 performance once again demonstrates the power of our differentiated flexible business model to succeed across many different geographic, economic and retail environments. We were thrilled to expand our global footprint into Austria, the Netherlands and Australia in 2015. So, now, we operate in nine countries across three continents. Looking ahead, I am very excited about the future of TJX. We entered 2016 with terrific momentum, and the year is off to a strong start. We are convinced that we can continue growing…

Thank you. We will now begin the question-and-answer session. Our first question comes from the line Omar Saad. Sir, your line is open.

Yes. It's Omar Saad at Evercore ISI. Thanks for taking my questions. Great quarter, guys. Wanted to dive in on the gross margin line a little bit deeper. Ernie and Scott, the transactional piece sounds a little bit bigger than perhaps we were thinking about it. I had been under the impression, in the European market, you buy in pounds and euros, but maybe Canada is different. And help me think about the potential to perhaps use price increase or mix as a way to offset the transactional impact, something that some other companies in the apparel space are using. Scott Goldenberg - Senior Executive Vice President & Chief Financial Officer: Well, first, I'll just give you a bit of the breakdown there. The components of the 4%, Omar, that we're talking about next year are largely split between translational, which is just taking the current British pound and the Canadian dollar with what averages we actually incurred last year. The rest of that is just, again, the drop-off of the currency that we've seen in both the British pound and Canadian dollar. And unfortunately, or fortunately for us, most of our purchases have not been made, so they're going to be subject now to this lower Canadian dollar. If we had bought out, like other chains, you would probably have less of an impact. But with a big drop-off, you're still going to have a drop-off that at this point is a bit more than last year. I'll now turn it over to Ernie. Ernie L. Herrman - Chief Executive Officer, President & Director: Yeah, Omar, a good question. What happens on that front – by the way, maybe adjusting retails would make sense if we saw others doing that. We haven't experienced that to that degree. And our number one strategy, as you can see, overall, has been to gain market share. So, we're on this mission to continue to offer the outrageous value and not being the first one to try to up the retail. So, we've been successful of recent by ensuring our value is the sharpest out there. So, we do not want to mess with that. And even though we're getting hit on the buying of the goods in U.S. dollars with the Canadian dollar translation, we still haven't moved our values. And I believe, if you'll look at our Canadian comps, it's helping us gain significant market share actually in that market. So, right now, that's the strategy that we're focused on.

Thanks. That makes a lot of sense, but just, Scott, to be clear, the Canadian market – you're buying in Canadian dollars for the Canadian market. But in the U.K., are you buying in British pounds, the cost of goods? Ernie L. Herrman - Chief Executive Officer, President & Director: So, Omar, what it is – actually, in both markets we buy certain percentage of the mix. And so, in Canada, and I think we've been public on this, we buy about half the mix in U.S. dollars and the other half is not. It's Canadian bought. So, that's still a big chunk, as you can imagine. Scott Goldenberg - Senior Executive Vice President & Chief Financial Officer: And then, in Europe, we buy... Ernie L. Herrman - Chief Executive Officer, President & Director: Smaller, smaller... Scott Goldenberg - Senior Executive Vice President & Chief Financial Officer: Yeah, we – right. About half of our goods are bought, let's just say, between U.S. dollars and euro and then... Ernie L. Herrman - Chief Executive Officer, President & Director: Right. Scott Goldenberg - Senior Executive Vice President & Chief Financial Officer: That's about half-split between – of that 50% between the U.S. dollar and the euro. Ernie L. Herrman - Chief Executive Officer, President & Director: Right.

Thank you. That's really helpful. Good luck, guys. Ernie L. Herrman - Chief Executive Officer, President & Director: Thank you.

Thank you. Your next question comes from the line of Richard Jaffe. Sir, your line is open. Richard Jaffe - Stifel, Nicolaus & Co., Inc.: Thanks very much, guys, and really, congratulations on a very strong quarter. I guess, a two-part question; one is, the traffic strength has been remarkable. I'm wondering, what are the levers you're pulling or what is the source of the success there, marketing, direct mail, the e-commerce, the effort we've seen in the U.S. And then, if you could just comment briefly on the decrease in ticket at Marmaxx and if it's the same at each division. Ernie L. Herrman - Chief Executive Officer, President & Director: Okay, Richard. So, let's start at the top there. In terms of the traffic, first of all, there are a lot of levers being pulled, just as you mentioned. Marketing – it's never one thing. Obviously, we won't give any specific breakdowns on it, but marketing is a play. We've been very happy, as you can see, and you witnessed some of it. I'm sure, some of the creative we've had out there like our tri-brand campaign at holiday and we like what we're hitting out there with – for this first quarter coming up. Our loyalty programs have been strong, so also very happy with that. I would tell you one of the key drivers, though, still, especially in a business like ours, which has so much traffic and frequency of shopping, is that we've been executing the model, which is to deliver great goods at exciting values. And we've been going after, clearly, these brands and quality and fashion at retails that, in some cases, are obviously lower. That's a piece of why the average ticket had dropped, so to your question there. By the way, your other part of your question, with the average ticket drop, we've had a little bit of it in the other divisions, but Marmaxx has really been more or so the division that has experienced more of it. It's not as big a swing in other places in the corporation. But the traffic, we've been happy with it because we feel like we're working on all fronts. And even at this point in time, the amount of branded pack-away opportunities that have existed out there has really allowed us to position ourselves going into the new year, we think, to continue to help with the traffic pull. Richard Jaffe - Stifel, Nicolaus & Co., Inc.: How much is that pack-away? Ernie L. Herrman - Chief Executive Officer, President & Director: We cannot give you that number. That is a good question. If you'd like to, maybe you'd like to ask Carol to see if she'd...

Yeah, you'll get that out of me.

Thanks, Carol. Richard Jaffe - Stifel, Nicolaus & Co., Inc.: Thank you very much. Ernie L. Herrman - Chief Executive Officer, President & Director: You're welcome.

Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Kimberly Greenberger. Ma'am, your line is open. Kimberly Conroy Greenberger - Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC: Great. Thanks so much. I was wondering – Scott, you talked about rising supply chain costs. Is there -- can you just put some numbers around that? Are supply chain costs simply increasing because TJX volumes continue to grow quarter after quarter and year after year? Or is there some deleveraging happening within the supply chain? And I'm wondering if you have any initiative in 2016 or 2017 on the supply chain side. Thanks so much. Scott Goldenberg - Senior Executive Vice President & Chief Financial Officer: Yeah. The biggest piece of the supply chain cost than last year and will be more in first half-oriented this year relate to the lower average retail at Marmaxx and the cost – moving more units through – moving through our networks. So, we would expect that piece of that to moderate substantially in the back half at the moment. The other piece, frankly, relates to – we did not plan, going back a few years ago, the 7% to 8% comps that we've experienced at HomeGoods, the double-digit comp increase that we've had at Canada, thereby necessitating really more of a timing moving forward some of the needs for our supply chain infrastructure. And even a little bit of that at Marmaxx, given the lower average retail. So, this is more of a timing over the next year or two years, where we continue to have those incremental costs and we would see that moderate over time. Ernie L. Herrman - Chief Executive Officer, President & Director: And at the same time, adding into that, we have, as you've seen in the plans, we've upped the amount of HomeGoods new store openings, which is also in addition to our – obviously, our comps, is adding to additional capacity needs because we're very bullish on the future of our store openings with HomeGoods. Kimberly Conroy Greenberger - Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC: All high-class problems. Thanks so much, and congratulations on a great year. Ernie L. Herrman - Chief Executive Officer, President & Director: Thank you.

Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Matthew Boss. Sir, your line is open.

Yeah. Hey, congrats on a great quarter, guys. Ernie L. Herrman - Chief Executive Officer, President & Director: Thank you.

So, as we think about SG&A, if you excluded the wage investment this year, would the comp leverage point in 2016 still be around that 2% hurdle? And then, just as we think about the investment opportunities, how would you rank them this year and next between international, systems, e-commerce? Clearly, a lot of different ways you guys can take the investments. And then, finally just any color on your current business post holiday, I think, would be really helpful, just given all the disruption from some of your competitors. Ernie L. Herrman - Chief Executive Officer, President & Director: Matthew, I will – let me just start with some of the color. We'll let Scott speak to the SG&A. That's in his wheelhouse, so to speak. On the investing, first of all, we do what we think makes sense in each area. Clearly, we look at each independently. Like, international, we look at there versus systems versus e-commerce. We look at a strategy independently of each and decide what we think is the right long-term and the appropriate amount. So, I'd tell you on our e-commerce business, we've discussed this before, it's a relatively small piece of our business and we are taking an approach there of investing in a very methodical way and a careful way. Having said that, we're very happy with the business where it is today. We just will – we will keep that in ratio to the benefit and where we think we are headed with that. In systems, there's certainly a maintenance side to that and a part of running the business that we are cognizant of. And in international, clearly, you can tell from what we talked about in the script, that is a key focus for us and we have shown…

Okay. Great. Best of luck, guys. Ernie L. Herrman - Chief Executive Officer, President & Director: Matt, thank you.

Thank you. Your next question comes from the line of Paul Lejuez. Sir, your line is open.

Hey. Thanks, guys. On the Trade Secret business, is that currently losing money? If it is, could you share with us how much in 2015 and maybe how much in 2016? And just thinking about now that you have the Australian business, does that change your pack-away strategy at all? Just given seasons are opposite, might you use less pack-away in the North American business, maybe ship some of the goods down there? I'm just wondering, obviously, related to that, does it maybe change your open-to-buy here in North America? Thanks. Scott Goldenberg - Senior Executive Vice President & Chief Financial Officer: So, Paul, I'm not going to give a lot of color, But clearly, in the fourth quarter and the early part of this year, the Trade Secret acquisition will be a large portion of the decrease in the TJX International and a relatively – an impact but a relatively small impact over the course of the year for TJX in total. Ernie L. Herrman - Chief Executive Officer, President & Director: Paul, on the – on your merchandise, really, mix and opportunity question there, it's – which by the way is a great question because we – one of the benefits we've liked about it is we have been able to bob and weave, so to speak, the way you have just described it. So, we're able to take things that are a little out of season here and go there with it. Now, you have to keep in mind, we're dealing with 35 stores versus billions right? So, it's not a major swing impact for, like, the Marmaxx guys or the home businesses here. But there is a strong benefit for the new Australian business for Trade Secret because they're able to take advantage, to your point,…

Great. Thanks and good luck. Ernie L. Herrman - Chief Executive Officer, President & Director: Welcome.

Thank you. Our next question is from the line of Stephen Grambling. Sir, your line is open. Stephen Grambling - Goldman Sachs & Co.: Hey, good morning. I have a bit of a big picture question and one follow-up, if I can. We often hear pushback from investors on how big off-price can be and if it really needs full price, and this quarter seems to alleviate those concerns. But can you give us any thoughts you have on that relationship between the full-price and the off-price, how that might be changing any quantification of how big the off-price market should be or can be? Ernie L. Herrman - Chief Executive Officer, President & Director: So, Stephen, obviously, I guess, you would say – in a big, big picture, you'd say you're asking a group of people that are maybe not totally objective on this because we would say off-price can continue to get bigger and bigger and bigger, and we are not as high on the full-price business for a reason. I think, in the environment that we're in right now, by the way, I think the value of off-price business still plays better and some of the results that come out there, I think that will validate that. The reason we – if you look – actually, if you look at our store growth that we've laid out, that tells you how bullish we are and then if you look at, I think some of the other reports that have been out recently over the last couple of months on other types of retail that do not have store growth going the other way, so to speak, I think that would tell you that we believe the off-price is the big opportunity. And we just never – sometimes…

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Lorraine Hutchinson. Ma'am, your line is open.

Thanks. Good morning. I wanted to follow up on the guidance for flat ticket in the second half. Is this just a matter of lapping last year's initiatives? And is there an opportunity to continue to sharpen the value proposition for customers as we move through the year? Ernie L. Herrman - Chief Executive Officer, President & Director: Lorraine, it's funny. We talk about this quite a bit internally here. And so, we would say we expect it to moderate second quarter of next year. You're exactly accurate. Part of that was a mix component, if you remember. There were really two facets. One, buying, because of the nature of the environment right now, buying the same goods for less. But, then you have the other half of the component, which was really just we juggled some of the mixes, and the penetrations of certain mixes with lower ticket went up. So, it created a mix content issue. To your question, we would think that's going to happen. The only thing I would tell you is we have bought so little of that time period at this point because we're so opportunistic that we have so much open-to-buy for the second quarter that we could end up, yes, we could end up slightly down in ticket again. I doubt it would be to the degree that we have had it last year over the year before, but it could be down a few points. It's possible because we don't want to predict. One of the best parts of this business is when we have significant open-to-buy, we don't feel a need to have to call it today on where we could end up then. We want to go with the best values that are out there.

Great. And then, can you talk about any trends at HomeGoods in terms of ticket? Have those been up or down over the past couple of years? Ernie L. Herrman - Chief Executive Officer, President & Director: We don't really talk about that. It's been kind of uneventful, I would say. And ticket has not been a component of that business. They are just doing so many other things that are driving the business clearly. And we're just happy with the business because of all the execution on the other fronts. If you walk in there, as you know, it's one of our – I would say our most impulsive mix store – it's difficult if you're a customer to walk in and not spend $200. I guess that's the way we like to describe it. Because there's so much exciting impulse merchandise there. So, it's really less of, like, a ticket issue there and more about the ever-changing – and I think you guys are aware, Lorraine, I'm sure you heard from us about how fast we turn HomeGoods, right? It is our fastest turning business. So, I think we're getting a customer there that not only is it impulsive to begin with, she could go back a week and a half later and it's different again. So, we're excited about it.

Well, thank you. Ernie L. Herrman - Chief Executive Officer, President & Director: You're welcome.

Thank you. And our last question comes from the line of Mike Baker. Sir, your line is open.

Thanks. I'll finish up by asking about the competitive environment relative to department stores and promotions. We know that they were pretty heavy in the inventory and pretty promotional because of the warm weather earlier in the winter. So, did you see that? How did you work against that? But more importantly, are you seeing any change in the promotional environment? Presumably, department stores have started to work through some of that inventory, and the weather has gotten a little bit more seasonal in some areas. So, are you seeing less promotional competitive pressures out there? Ernie L. Herrman - Chief Executive Officer, President & Director: Mike, we haven't. I have to tell you, I have seen no (58:23) major shift of recent. Yeah, I mean, right now, you see less relative to fourth quarter because that's the nature of the time period when you're transitioning into the new season. So, yes, there's less right now than there was before. However, if you ask me how does it compare this year to last year for department stores, I could not answer that. We try to kind of focus on what we're feeling here. What we feel in general is an environment of, again, a lot of availability of merchandise. And so, we don't know where that – some of it's department stores, some of it's specialty stores, some of it's other types of stores. So, that's really our only barometer. In terms of their promotional activity, again, not sure. We do see their ticket actually declining is our perception. We see – I would say not declining, but we see their ticket kind of staying into the zone than it's been to last year. Kind of very similar, like, we don't see any major shifts, I guess, in what they're carrying.

Okay, understood. One more, if I could. If – I think I have these numbers right. When you jump out the wage in the currency, your earnings growth last year at this time, you talked about 9% to 12%. This year, if you add back the 8% points from those things, it's more like 7% to 11%. So, is the lower expected growth excluding all those two one-time things? Is it because of the investments you're making or is there something else in there? Scott Goldenberg - Senior Executive Vice President & Chief Financial Officer: Well, the primary difference – or one of the biggest difference is the wage versus last year. But also, we don't have as high a level of merchandise margin increase also compared to last year. So, we – as we talked about, we still have a merchandise margin that's planned up excluding the currency. So – but we do – it's not planned at the levels that – higher levels that we had on the plan last year.

Okay... Scott Goldenberg - Senior Executive Vice President & Chief Financial Officer: Again, comparable 1% to 2% comp that we had last year.

Right, right, of course. Scott Goldenberg - Senior Executive Vice President & Chief Financial Officer: Those would be the two of the bigger components. Ernie L. Herrman - Chief Executive Officer, President & Director: And, Mike, I would like to reiterate, and I think we say this often, that we always plan conservatively. And as you know, our intention is always to beat these plans. So, we are clearly putting together what we believe is the right plan to put together. But we – our intention is to certainly surpass the plan.

Understood. Appreciate that. Thank you. Ernie L. Herrman - Chief Executive Officer, President & Director: Thank you. Ernie L. Herrman - Chief Executive Officer, President & Director: I think that was our last question. We look forward to having the opportunity to talk with you guys again after the first quarter. Thank you, all, for your time today.