Nice Showing Resiliency; Still, Caution Drives Our Estimates Slightly Lower; FVE Down to $265

Narrow-moat Nice reported good fourth-quarter results slightly above our revenue expectations and above the high end of adjusted EPS guidance. It also provided its first-quarter and full-year 2023 outlooks, which were both slightly below our at-consensus expectations. Impressively, the company is not experiencing the same kind of demand slowdown we see across most of our software group. Because of this consistency, we have generally maintained our estimates throughout 2022, but in an effort for conservatism in a choppy environment, we are modestly lowering our growth and profitability estimates over the next several years. As a result, we are lowering our fair value estimate to $265, from $296 previously. We see shares as attractive and believe that Nice is emerging as the clear leader in cloud contact center solutions.