Short Interest in NICE Ltd. (NASDAQ:NICE) Declines By 31.5%

NICE Ltd. (NASDAQ:NICE) saw a significant drop in short interest in the month of May. As of May 15th, there was short interest totalling 1,130,000 shares, a drop of 31.5% from the April 30th total of 1,650,000 shares. Based on an average daily volume of 540,100 shares, the days-to-cover ratio is presently 2.1 days. Currently, 1.8% of the company’s stock are sold short.

NICE Price Performance

Shares of NICE stock traded down $2.66 during trading hours on Friday, reaching $164.83. The company had a trading volume of 314,278 shares, compared to its average volume of 564,405. The company has a 50 day moving average of $156.60 and a 200 day moving average of $163.89. The firm has a market cap of $10.43 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 24.38, a P/E/G ratio of 1.07 and a beta of 1.03. NICE has a 1-year low of $137.19 and a 1-year high of $200.65.

NICE (NASDAQ:NICE) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, May 15th. The technology company reported $2.87 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.84 by $0.03. The company had revenue of $700.19 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $699.46 million. NICE had a return on equity of 16.17% and a net margin of 16.18%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 6.2% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business posted $2.58 EPS. As a group, sell-side analysts forecast that NICE will post 9.85 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several analysts have recently weighed in on NICE shares. Wedbush restated an “outperform” rating and set a $200.00 target price on shares of NICE in a research note on Friday, May 16th. JMP Securities restated a “market outperform” rating and set a $300.00 target price on shares of NICE in a research note on Friday, May 16th. Royal Bank of Canada restated an “outperform” rating and set a $200.00 target price on shares of NICE in a research note on Friday, May 16th. Wall Street Zen downgraded NICE from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday, February 17th. Finally, Citigroup lowered their target price on NICE from $214.00 to $211.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, May 19th. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and eleven have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $211.50.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Large investors have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Barrow Hanley Mewhinney & Strauss LLC bought a new stake in shares of NICE in the 4th quarter valued at $313,808,000. Migdal Insurance & Financial Holdings Ltd. increased its position in shares of NICE by 12.3% in the 1st quarter. Migdal Insurance & Financial Holdings Ltd. now owns 1,766,270 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $272,306,000 after buying an additional 193,000 shares in the last quarter. Boston Partners increased its position in shares of NICE by 10.0% in the 4th quarter. Boston Partners now owns 1,670,327 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $283,349,000 after buying an additional 151,528 shares in the last quarter. Menora Mivtachim Holdings LTD. increased its position in shares of NICE by 2.3% in the 4th quarter. Menora Mivtachim Holdings LTD. now owns 1,660,037 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $281,941,000 after buying an additional 36,865 shares in the last quarter. Finally, HMI Capital Management L.P. increased its position in shares of NICE by 12.8% in the 4th quarter. HMI Capital Management L.P. now owns 1,642,770 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $279,008,000 after buying an additional 186,600 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 63.34% of the company’s stock.

NICE Company Profile

NICE Ltd., together with its subsidiaries, provides cloud platforms for AI-driven digital business solutions worldwide. It offers CXone, a cloud native open platform; Enlighten, an AI engine for the customer engagement market; and smart self service enable organizations to address consumers' needs; and journey orchestration solutions that empower organizations to connect and route customers to deal with the customer's request, and connects them using real time AI-based routing.