On Friday, U.S. retailer and clothing designer Ralph Lauren (RL) reported earnings for the fourth quarter. The results were better than Wall Street expected, although the company's tepid outlook has sent shares lower. As investors digest the news, here are three key questions for Ralph Lauren (the man, not the company) if we had five minutes with the CEO.
上周五，美国零售及时装设计公司拉尔夫o劳伦（Ralph Lauren）公布了第四季度业绩。虽然平淡的前景造成公司股价下跌，但它的业绩依然好于华尔街预期。如果投资者在消化业绩数据时能和拉尔夫o劳伦（本人，而不是这家公司）待上五分钟，他们就会向这位首席执行官提出三个关键问题。
Here goes …
这些问题有：
On licensing
关于授权经营
Ralph Lauren is a company that has successfully navigated through decade-long mega-cycles over the past 40 years, and it's starting a new one right now. Some cycles have been choppy, some were perfectly executed. But the most successful had to do with regaining control over designing and selling different labels and product classifications. The most favorable cycle -- by a country mile -- was the one that just ended. And though some might argue otherwise, there's no doubt in our mind that it did in fact end.
拉尔夫o劳伦公司在过去40年中经历了几个为期十年的大周期，现在正要进入一个新的周期。有些周期起伏不定，有些则完成得很完美。但最成功的莫过于重新掌控各类品牌和产品的设计与销售。最有利的周期（远远超过其他周期）刚刚结束。虽然有些人不这么认为，但在我们看来这个周期已经毫无疑问地结束了。
The strongest cycles were when the retailer was taking back control of its content (as opposed to licensing it out). For example, taking back a handbag license when the licensee only generated $100 million in sales on what should have been a billion dollar business. Or taking back a $400 million label from Jones Apparel Group when Jones was generating a 28% margin and only paying Ralph Lauren 7%. There are over a dozen examples. But with Ralph Lauren taking back the Chaps label from PVH/Warnaco, there are officially no more meaningful licenses the retailer can pull back in house.
最强劲的周期是公司收回内容控制权（而非对外授权）的时候。例如，手提包业务的规模原本应该达到几十亿美元，如果被许可人的销售额只有1亿美元，公司就会收回授权。或者琼斯服装集团（Jones Apparel Group）的利润率达到了28%，拉尔夫o劳伦却只能获得前者7%的利润，它也会收回这个价值4亿美元的品牌。还有很多这样的例子。但从PVH/ Warnaco公司收回Chaps品牌之后，拉尔夫o劳伦已经没有规模较大的授权可以收回了。
This matters because these license acquisitions are some of the most accretive deals we've seen in retail -- and that's not just because the acquisition costs for Ralph Lauren have usually been zero. While the retailer regained control of its content, we saw return on net operating assets go from 13% to 26% -- making Ralph Lauren one of the highest return retailers in its segment of retail.
这一点很重要，因为收购这些授权是我们在零售行业见到的增值能力最强的活动，而且这不只是因为拉尔夫o劳伦的收购成本通常为零。重新获得内容控制权后，我们发现这家公司经营性资产的净回报率从13%升至26%，从而使拉尔夫o劳伦成为这个零售细分市场中回报率最高的零售商之一。
Question:Ralph Lauren is starting off a new cycle where it has to invest significant capital to grow. The opportunities are there, we think. But there's a real capital cost that needs to be put against these ideas. Is it mathematically possible for these new initiatives to be higher return than the slam-dunk growth opportunities the retailer has had over the past 10 years? If not, how should we think about the trajectory of financial returns? If returns go down, the multiple probably is not going up.
问题：拉尔夫o劳伦正要进入一个新的周期，必须投入大量资金来实现增长。我们认为机遇是存在的，但要考虑到实际的资本成本。从数学角度而言，这些新举措的回报率有没有希望超过10年来的高增长机遇为拉尔夫o劳伦带来的回报率？如果不能，我们对财务回报率应该有怎样的预期？如果回报率下降，估值倍数就很可能不会上升。
On succession planning
关于继任计划
There are only seven CEOs in the 500 companies listed in the Standard & Poor's Index who are 74 or older. Ralph Lauren is one of them. Interestingly enough, this year with the pseudo-retirement of longtime second-in-command Roger Farrah (who has been critical to the retailer's growth trajectory), Lauren is taking a greater role in the organization as opposed to the diminishing role one might expect from a 74-year-old CEO. We're okay with that for one reason -- and that's the enhanced responsibilities given to chief financial officer Chris Peterson, who added chief accounting officer to his role this year. We think that Peterson is every bit the rock star that Farrah was.
标普500指数（S&P 500）的成分股公司中，只有七位首席执行官的年龄达到或超过了74岁，而拉尔夫o劳伦就是其中之一。有趣的是，随着这家公司长期以来的二把手罗杰o法拉（一直是公司增长的关键人物）今年进入“假退休”状态，人们或许会认为，74岁的首席执行官劳伦的作用也会不断下降。但实际情况正好相反，劳伦开始发挥更重要的作用。我们认为这样做没问题，原因是首席财务官克里斯o彼得森将承担更大的责任，而且会在今年兼任首席会计官。我们认为彼得森与法拉如出一辙，都是“摇滚明星”式的管理者。
But what we don't know is what the company will look like in a Ralph-less state. We understand why the company is unlikely to openly discuss succession. Few companies do. But we don't necessarily need to know its plan -- we just need to know that it has one. That's where we're unsure about Ralph Lauren.
但我们还不知道，如果缺少拉尔夫，这家公司会陷入什么样的状态。我们理解为什么这家公司不太可能公开讨论继任者问题。很少有公司这样做。但我们不一定要知道这项计划的内容，我们只需要知道公司存在这样的计划。在我们看来，这就是拉尔夫o劳伦公司的不确定之处。
We can't imagine that the CEO starts off every board meeting saying, "Let's talk about who's going to take my job." Also, unlike other iconic majority holders in a dual-class structure company -- like Phil Knight at Nike (NKE), who exited gradually and gracefully -- Ralph remains critical to product design and the strategic direction of the brand.
身为首席执行官，拉尔夫o劳伦不可能在每次董事会议开始时都说：“大家讨论一下我的继任者问题吧。”此外，与其他双层股权结构公司中的标志性大股东——比如逐步优雅地淡出耐克（Nike）的菲尔o奈特——不同的是，拉尔夫对产品设计和品牌战略方向仍然发挥着至关重要的作用。
So on one hand, we absolutely want him to remain in his current role. But on the other, we need to gain some confidence that the company will not miss a beat in the event that we wake up one day and Ralph Lauren is no longer a part of the company he built.
因此，一方面我们当然希望他继续担任CEO；而另一方面，我们需要在某种程度上相信，即使有一天拉尔夫o劳伦离开了，这家公司也不会乱套。
Question:So the question for Ralph is whether he has given the board a mandate to go external for the next CEO, or if it will come from within? If the latter, will Ralph hand the keys over to David Lauren (EVP marketing) as his legacy? The question for Peterson, Nemerov, Farrah and the rest of the "Office of the Chairman" is whether or not they have confidence that a succession plan actually exists? This seems like a bogus question, but it's one we need to be crystal clear on for a company with $13 billion in equity value and has one holder who accounts for over 60% of the voting power.
问题：所以向拉尔夫提出的问题是，他是否已经授权董事会在外部寻找下一任首席执行官，还是会从内部选出接班人？如果是后一种情况，拉尔夫是否会选择大卫o劳伦（营销执行副总裁）作为其继任者？向彼得森、首席运营官内梅罗夫、法拉和“董事长办公室”其他成员提出的问题是，他们是否相信确实存在继任计划？这似乎是个伪命题，但鉴于这家公司的权益价值为130亿美元，而且有一位投票权超过60％的股东，所以我们必须清楚地了解这个问题。
On your pile of cash
关于手头现金的堆垒
Ralph Lauren today has never had this much cash before, which happens to come at a time when there are fewer acquisition opportunities than at any time in the past 20 years. Specifically, over the next five years, the company should generate nearly $7 billion in cash from operations, and maintenance capex of maybe $1.75 billion. Tack on another $850 million in dividends, another $1 billion in stock repurchases to offset the dilutive impact of options. That's about $3.6 billion, and leaves an extra $3.4 billion in cash -- on top of the $500 million in net cash you already have.
目前，拉尔夫o劳伦公司手中的现金规模前所未有，不巧的是，现在是20年来收购机会最少的时候。具体来说，在今后5年中，这家公司的经营活动应该会产生近70亿美元的现金，而维持性资本支出可能为17.5亿美元，分红可能需要8.5亿美元，还有10亿美元用于股票回购，以抵消期权的摊薄影响——共计36亿美元左右。这样，还剩下34亿美元现金（而且它手头已经有了5亿美元净现金）。
Question:Will you push for the board (i.e. Ralph) to meaningfully step up stock repo activity? You'll get paid more for that than for building a war chest of cash. But the real question is how many high-return capital projects can you invest in to deploy that capital in a way that will accelerate top line growth and/or margin improvement?
问题：你会不会督促董事会（或者说拉尔夫）大力加强股票回购力度？这样做的回报将超过持有越来越多的现金。但真正的问题是，有多少可供投资的高回报资本项目能让你通过运用这些资金来提高收入增长率和/或利润率？
Bonus question on cyclical margin risk (knowing full well that we're already well over our theoretical 5-minute time limit)
关于周期性利润率风险的附加问题（我们充分意识到，现在已经远远超过了假设的五分钟时间限制）
About 40% of your cash flow comes from U.S. department stores. While that is down materially from retail and international sales were both in their infancy, it's still a big pill to swallow. Your real estate and positioning within department stores is probably the most defendable of any major brand. But one fact remains -- the department store group as a whole just completed year five of a margin expansion cycle and is now sitting at peak margins. There has never been a margin expansion cycle that's lasted longer than ... you guessed it ... five years.
你们约40%的现金流来自美国的百货公司业务。虽然这远低于零售业务产生的现金流，而且国际销售也处于起步阶段，但这仍是一个大问题。虽然在所有大品牌中，贵公司的不动产和在百货公司领域的定位很可能具有最强的防御能力，但依然存在这样一个事实，那就是百货公司业务的整体利润率刚刚度过了上升周期的第五个年头，现在的利润率正处于最高点；而且正如大家所想到的那样，此前还没有哪个利润率上升周期能延续五年以上的时间。
Question:If we see margins correct in your U.S. wholesale channel, do you think that the macro factors causing the decline would also hit your retail business? Do you think you can sustain margin even in the event of a broader industry margin correction? What levers do you have to pull to help you deliver?
问题：如果我们发现贵公司美国批发渠道的利润率回落，你觉得导致它下降的宏观因素是否也会影响你们的零售业务？你认为在整个行业的利润率出现滑坡的情况下，你们是否还能保持利润率水平？需要通过哪些手段来帮助你们实现这个目标？（财富中文网）
Brian McGough is Managing Director and Retail Sector Head at Hedgeye Risk Management.
作者是金融研究机构Hedgeye Risk Management董事总经理兼零售行业负责人。