---
ticker: "VEEV"
company: "Veeva Systems Inc."
date: "2026-10-26"
view: "Hold"
fair_value: 296.27
price: 318.34
price_source: "last trade 2026-10-26 17:15:55 UTC (official close 2026-10-23: 323.04)"
price_time: "2026-10-26T17:15:55Z"
price_vs_fair_value: "+7.4%"
bear: 171.63
bull: 468.38
exit_price: 360.26
p_price_justified: "20-50%"
restated: "2026-10-26"
method: "case-spread-2026-10-24"
original_fair_value: 296
original_view: "Hold"
page: "https://alpha.dming.si/research/2026-10-26-veev-2"
---

# VEEV · Veeva Systems Inc. · Hold

Research report as of 2026-10-26, unblinded. Page: https://alpha.dming.si/research/2026-10-26-veev-2

We value VEEV at $296 a share. The report's $318.34 price (Oct 26, 2026) was 7% above fair value: Hold.

_Restated Oct 26, 2026 (method case-spread-2026-10-24); the report's original value was $296, Hold._

| Lens | Range | Marks |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Our report | $172 to $468 | fair $296; original $296 |
| Our simulation | $175 to $519 | median $287 |
| Street targets (28) | $165 to $360 | average $296, median $308 |
| Price | | $318.34 |

Bands run from our bear to bull (the hollow mark is the original $296), our simulation's 10th to 90th percentile and the Street's low to high. Street targets forecast future prices, not value today. Market data, captured Oct 26, 2026.

| Figure | Value |
| --- | --- |
| Fair value | $296 |
| Price | $318.34 (market data, Oct 26, 10:15 AM PT) |
| Five-year return | 7.7% (a year, at the report's price) |
| Bear / bull | $172 / $468 |
| Exit price | $360 (on Jan 31, 2032) |
| Confidence | 30% |
| Price against our scenarios | The price is justified in 20-50% of our scenarios (4,000 simulated outcomes, each drawing the uncertain drivers from ranges we chose: our judgement, not a measured chance) |

**What the price needs.** Any one of these, on its own, would justify the price:

- Revenue growth FY28-33 vs central: needs 1.5%, we have 0.0%
- Non-GAAP margin vs central: needs 3.0%, we have 0.0%
- Stock pay vs central: needs -3.0%, we have 0.0%

_This text argues the original call. The current figures are at the top._

**Original call, Oct 26, 2026 (before the Oct 26, 2026 restatement)**

_As of 2026-10-26 · unblinded: the 2026-10-15 report, its price and its restated values were read before this model was built (assumptions.md)_

- **Fair value today:** $296 per diluted share, discounting at a 9.57% cost of equity. Weighting bear, central and bull 25/50/25 (our weights) gives $308.
- **Price:** $318.34, last trade 2026-10-26 17:15:55 UTC (official close 2026-10-23: $323.04) → fair value 6.9% below
- **Five-year exit price:** $360 on 2032-01-31: the average of a long fade of Veeva's returns toward maturity ($194) and an outside view at 41.9x FY32 operating profit ($527); at 10/20 years $352/$368
- **Five-year return:** 7.7% a year from $318.34 (no dividend), against a 9.57% cost of equity
- **Bear / bull today:** $172 / $468 from coherent operating cases
- **Range by exit anchor:** $273-304, all Hold; only the method's unmoved default (48.7x, $322) is a Buy, and below 35.3x the rule says Avoid
- **Confidence:** 30% that the 2032-01-31 value lands within ±20% of $360 (subjective, not calibrated)
- **Moat:** Wide in R&D and Quality, where Vault holds drugmakers' regulated records; narrower in Commercial, where Salesforce now competes for CRM
- **Market expects:** Revenue growth about 1.5 points a year above ours, close to the Street's path and management's $6B 2030 goal, or an exit at 47.6x
- **Price needs:** One of: revenue growth 1.5 points a year above ours FY28-33; non-GAAP margin 3 points higher; stock pay 3 points of revenue lower; or an exit at 0.98x anchor (d) (ours 0.86x)
- **P(price justified):** 40% that fair value is $318.34 or more (4,000 draws; median $287, 10th-90th $175-519; subjective, not calibrated; odds.json)
- **Key driver:** Revenue growth FY28-33: 1.5 points a year is +$22 / −$20 a share; the exit multiple at the unmoved anchor (d) is +$26
- **Street:** Average target $296.50, median $307.50, range $165-360 (market data, read 2026-10-26); three targets in the last month averaged $345. An expectations reference, not validation

**We rate Veeva Hold.** Our value is $296 a share against $318.34 this
morning and $323.04 at Friday's close. The shared rule calls a stock a Buy at
or below our value and an Avoid when our value is below 85% of the price
(above $348.55 here); the price sits between.

This report replaces a Buy no one researched. Our 2026-10-15 report said
Avoid at $202. Changes to the shared valuation method since then restated it
to $322 and Buy, with no new Veeva work. Two audits found that Buy unsound.
We agree on one point and only one: the restated exit multiple, 48.7x
operating profit, averages Veeva's own ten-year median, earned while it grew
25% a year, with its peers'. Our forecast has Veeva growing 9% in 2032, when
it is valued. Software companies that slowed like that fetched a median 0.86
times this kind of anchor five years later. That gives 41.9x and $296.

**Terms.**
- **Bear, central and bull cases:** the central case is our best estimate;
  the bear is a severe but plausible bad outcome, the bull the matching good
  one. Each is one consistent business.
- **Long fade:** values the company in January 2032 by letting its profit
  growth fall in a straight line from 8.5% to 3% over 15 years, and its
  return on new investment from very high to 40%, discounted at 9.57%.
- **Outside view:** values the same 2032 profit at a multiple other
  companies traded at. The method's default, **anchor (d)**, is the average
  of Veeva's own median enterprise value to operating profit (EV/EBIT) over
  its last ten fiscal years and its peers' median of their own.
- **Operating profit (EBIT)** is GAAP, after stock pay. **NOPAT** is
  operating profit after tax.
- Fiscal years end January 31: FY32 is the year to 2032-01-31.

## 1. What is new since 2026-10-15: no filing, one event ahead

- No 8-K has been filed since the Q2 FY27 10-Q of 2026-08-27
  (`scripts/research-events.py`, 2026-10-26). Q3 FY27 results are not yet
  dated by the company; last year's came on 2025-11-20.
- Veeva's news page adds nothing after the IQVIA clinical-operations release
  of 2026-10-13, which the earlier report weighed. Vault CRM stands at 14 of
  the top 20 biopharmas committed, six to Salesforce (press release
  2026-09-23).
- **Investor Day, 2026-11-05.** What could change: the $6B 2030 revenue
  run-rate goal (our central reaches $5.7B leaving FY31; reaching the goal
  is worth about $20 a share), the CRM share target and the margin path. A
  new goal is a target; we would move the forecast only on a plan that backs
  it with dated evidence, such as a higher FY28 guide.
- The price has risen 1.7% since the 2026-10-15 report ($313.11 then) and
  108% from its 2026-06-22 close of $153.16 (market data closes,
  `data/daily-closes.json`).

The operating forecast is therefore the 2026-10-15 report's, imported
unchanged into model.py; its sources are in that report's
assumptions.md:

| Central, $M | FY27 | FY28 | FY29 | FY30 | FY31 | FY32 | FY33 |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Revenue | 3,736 | 4,198 | 4,621 | 5,053 | 5,517 | 6,016 | 6,523 |
| Revenue growth | 16.9% | 12.3% | 10.1% | 9.4% | 9.2% | 9.1% | 8.4% |
| GAAP operating profit | 1,139 | 1,307 | 1,487 | 1,682 | 1,899 | 2,074 | 2,249 |
| NOPAT | 877 | 1,007 | 1,145 | 1,295 | 1,462 | 1,597 | 1,732 |

The Street's revenue (market data, read 2026-10-26) is $3.69B, $4.14B, $4.65B,
$5.14B and $5.78B for FY27-31: within 5% of ours each year, but compounding
at 11.8% from FY27 to FY31 against our 10.2%. That growth gap is where we
differ from the Street on the business (section 5).

## 2. The exit multiple: why 41.9x and not 48.7x

Anchor (d) for Veeva is 48.7x FY32 operating profit: the mean of Veeva's own
ten-year median (55.9x, fiscal years 2017-2026) and the median of six peers'
own medians (41.4x: Adobe 41.2x, Intuit 41.6x, Autodesk 49.3x, Tyler 66.0x,
PTC 40.1x, Roper 29.6x; Salesforce, Workday and Guidewire lack five valid
years). Veeva's 55.9x came while its revenue grew a median 24.9% a year; the
peers' while theirs grew 12.7%. Our central case grows 9.1% in FY32
(`anchor_growth.txt`). The anchor studies did not condition on growth, and
left open whether to discount a company's own fast-growth median
(`docs/research/studies/2026-10-23-exit-anchor-survivors/results.md`, "Open
item").

**What we use: what companies that slowed like Veeva actually fetched.** In
the survivor-free study's software sample (starts 1996-2021, listed and
delisted companies, peers as they stood), we take every start whose own
multiple was earned at 20% growth or more and which grew 12% or less five
years later: 86 starts from 29 companies (Adobe, Autodesk, Cadence,
Synopsys, Check Point, F5, Fair Isaac, Microsoft, Oracle, PTC, Roper and
others). Their own multiple five years on was a median **0.862 times** the
anchor (d) they started with (`exit_outcomes.txt`):

| Starts like Veeva | Rows | Realised over anchor (d) |
| --- | ---: | ---: |
| 1996-2009 | 55 | 0.904 |
| 2010-2021 | 31 | 0.833 |
| All | 86 | **0.862** |

48.7x × 0.862 = **41.9x**, our outside view. It is the report's one change
from the method's default; the method still sets the bear and bull multiples
from it (29.1x and 62.1x, the software group's 25th and 75th percentiles).

Why the ratio is used as it stands, not relative to all software: across all
605 software starts the realised multiple ran 0.83x the anchor for 1996-2009
starts and 1.30x for 2010-2021, which is why the method leaves the anchor
unscaled. Starts like Veeva ran 0.90x and 0.83x in the same two eras. Their
discount does not depend on which decade comes next, and it is below 1 in
both. These companies also slowed further than Veeva (a median 4.8% five
years on, against Veeva's 9.1%), so the ratio may be harsh rather than
lenient.

**What our blind draft did, and why we dropped it.** The draft (commit
`631134c`) moved each leg of anchor (d) along a slope measured across 610
software company-years in 2016-2025 (ten points of growth carried 1.35x the
multiple), which gave 35.9x and $273. Our reviewer tested that slope against
outcomes (`review/redteam/backtest_growth_move.txt`, rerun by us with the
same result): applied to past starts, even with the actual growth five years
on given in advance, it predicted the realised multiple worse than the
unmoved anchor (mean absolute log error 0.553 against 0.460), in both eras.
Regressing realised over anchor on the growth gap gives 0.12 (standard
error 0.21), not 3.03. A cross-section of companies at different growth
rates overstates how much one company's multiple falls as it slows: part of
the gap is quality that stays. Our auditor separately found that the draft's
medians lost the pairing of each year's multiple with that year's growth
(+$11.30) and that the slope's choices of range and company effects moved
the value by up to $26 (`review/codex-audit.md`). The draft's figures stay
in the table below as one view.

**The judgment range, and which anchor gives which rating** (`market.txt`;
operating case fixed; at $318.34 the rule says Avoid below a fair value of
$270.59 and Buy at or above $318.34):

| Outside view, EV/FY32 EBIT | Exit | Fair value | Rating |
| --- | ---: | ---: | --- |
| Fade alone, no outside view | $194 | $193 | Avoid |
| 19.1x, the 2026-10-15 report's peer multiple on a GAAP basis | $217 | $208 | Avoid |
| 24.2x, software companies growing 5-10% in 2016-2025, median | $249 | $227 | Avoid |
| 30.3x, latest fiscal-year-end multiples (Veeva 35.0x, peers' median 25.7x) | $287 | $251 | Avoid |
| 35.9x, the draft's cross-sectional growth slope | $322 | $273 | Hold |
| 40.5x, anchor (d) × Veeva-like starts 2010-2021 (0.833) | $351 | $291 | Hold |
| 40.8x, the draft's method with a within-company slope | $353 | $292 | Hold |
| 41.4x, peers' ten-year median alone, not moved | $357 | $294 | Hold |
| **41.9x, anchor (d) × Veeva-like starts (0.862), this report** | **$360** | **$296** | **Hold** |
| 42.6x, the draft's method with a straight line over all growth | $364 | $299 | Hold |
| 44.0x, anchor (d) × Veeva-like starts 1996-2009 (0.904) | $373 | $304 | Hold |
| 48.7x, anchor (d), the method's default | $402 | $322 | Buy |

Our judgment range is **$273-304**: from the draft's growth slope to the
earlier era's ratio. All of it is Hold. Below it, the rows rest on today's
or a sub-group's multiples, which the method's ten-year window does not use;
above it, only the unmoved anchor, which ignores that Veeva will grow at a
third of the rate its own multiple was earned at.

## 3. Value: $296, exit $360

| Case | FY32 growth | Fade | Outside view (EV/EBIT) | Exit price | Fair value at 9.57% |
| --- | ---: | ---: | --- | ---: | ---: |
| Bear | 6.0% | $105 | $236 (29.1x) | $171 | $172 |
| Central | 9.1% | $194 | $527 (41.9x) | $360 | $296 |
| Bull | 11.9% | $278 | $983 (62.1x) | $631 | $468 |

Fair value = free cash flow paid out each year plus the exit price, both
discounted at 9.57%, plus net cash of $7,209M ($43.68 a share) at face
today. Cost of equity 9.57% = 5.29% + 1.018 × 4.20% (the method's dated
risk-free rate and Damodaran's 2026-10-01 premium; beta the peers' median,
Blume-adjusted). Veeva's own beta (Blume 0.956) gives $302; Damodaran's
software beta (Blume 1.19) $282.

**The central exit in other terms:** $360 is 28.7x FY32 operating profit,
34.3x FY33 NOPAT. At a 40% mature return that implies 7.2% growth for ever,
against the fade's own 4.8%.

**Sensitivities** (central, `output.txt`): revenue growth ±1.5 points a year
+$22 / −$20; Commercial subscription growth −4 points a year (a deeper CRM
loss) −$17; non-GAAP margin ±2 points ±$15; stock pay 1.5 points lower
+$11; mature return 25% or 60% −$2 / +$1; exit ratio 0.833 or 0.904 −$6 /
+$8, unmoved anchor +$26.

## 4. The flags

**Flag 2: the view changed from Avoid to Buy without explanation.** The
change came from the method, in steps (`bridge.txt`; the split inside the
restatements is our auditor's, rerun in `bridge.py`):

| Step | Central fair value | View at $313.11 |
| --- | ---: | --- |
| 2026-10-15 report: median of a judged 19.8x NOPAT multiple, the fade and peers' 14.1x adjusted EBIT | $202.34 | Avoid |
| 2026-10-16 method: mean of fade and peers' multiple, with a temporary one-point cut to the cost of equity (+$22.15 of the move) | $240.42 | Avoid |
| 2026-10-18 method: cut removed; outside view at anchor (d), 48.7x GAAP EBIT | $327.36 | Hold |
| 2026-10-20: fade ported to the shared 15 years to 3% (−$3.36) and the risk-free rate reset to 5.29% (−$2.26) | $321.75 | Hold |
| 2026-10-22: Buy at or below fair value, no return hurdle | $321.75 | Buy |
| This report: same forecast at 2026-10-26 with refetched history | $322.36 | Buy |
| Draft 631134c: outside view moved by the cross-sectional growth slope (35.9x) | $272.79 | Hold |
| This report: outside view at anchor (d) × 0.862 (41.9x) | $296.27 | Hold |

The Avoid became a Buy through the outside view and the rule change, with
no change to Veeva's forecast. We keep the method's structure and change one
input, the exit multiple, for a reason specific to Veeva: its own multiple
was earned at growth its forecast does not have, and companies in that
position fetched less. The view is now Hold, $94 above the original report
and $25 below the restatement. The original's 19.8x NOPAT exit is not
restored: it was the fade alone, and the method now averages the fade with
an outside view by the owner's decision of 2026-10-16 (the fade alone had
put 23 of 23 reports below the Street).

**Flag 4: the outside view is far from the fade.** The central outside view
($527) is 172% above the fade ($194). The input behind the gap is the exit
multiple against the fade's path: the fade pays 15.4x FY32 operating profit,
because 8.5% growth fades to 3% over 15 years at 9.57%; the outside view
pays 41.9x, what companies that slowed like Veeva fetched. Which do we
believe? Neither alone. The fade is our own discount rate applied to our own
path; the outside view is what buyers paid. The method takes their mean by
rule. The 2026-10-18 study supports the outside view's construction (own and
peers' medians together missed less than either alone); it did not test the
fade-and-outside-view mean, which our draft wrongly implied.

**Flag 1: the move from the blind value.** $273 to $296 (+$23.48, +8.6%).
The one change is the exit ratio above. It rests on historical outcomes in
the study's data, rerun by us, not on a management claim or a Street
figure. It moves toward the price, and the reviewer who found it was
arguing the Buy side; we accepted it because the draft's slope failed the
test the outside view exists to pass.

**Flag 19** (judged exit more than 1.5x from anchor (d)) does not fire: 41.9x
is 0.86x the anchor.

## 5. Market expectations and how we differ

- **What the price needs:** at $318.34, revenue growth about 1.5 points a
  year above ours FY28-33, which is the Street's path (11.8% a year FY27-31
  against our 10.2%) and close to management's $6B goal (+1.3 points); or
  an exit at 47.6x, nearly the unmoved anchor; or margins 3 points higher.
- **The Street** targets $296.50 on average, below the price; discounted a
  year at 9.57% it is $270.60. The three targets set in the last month
  averaged $345 (market data summary).
- **Alpha's view** (Capfolio's ranking model, `alpha rank VEEV`, 2026-10-26,
  cache marked for rerating): rank 84 of 696, score 88.1, Strong; momentum
  A (rank 32), quality, growth, expectations and valuation C.
- **Timing, beside the view:** a strong uptrend, the highest close since at
  least January at $323.04 on 2026-10-23, above its 50-day average of $277
  and up 32% since the Q2 release. Momentum is not an input to our value.

**Where we differ:** growth from FY29, when the six top-20 accounts that
chose Salesforce leave Veeva CRM (support ends 2029-12-31). Our Commercial
subscription line slows to 5-6% then; the Street's FY30-31 revenue rests on
eight analysts and does not show the dip. **What settles it:** the FY28
guide (about 2027-03-03) and Commercial growth through FY29. If revenue
compounds near the Street's 12%, our value reaches the price.

## 6. Why the other side could be right

- **Growth may not fall to 9%.** R&D and Quality grew 19% in H1 FY27; AI
  products (Falcon, Study Builder Agent) could add a price line; the CEO
  expects to win back some of the six top-20 accounts in 2027-28. Street-
  like growth (+1.5 points) gives $319, the price; the bull gives $468.
- **Veeva's premium may outlast its growth.** A regulated system of record,
  no debt, 45% margins before stock pay. The unmoved anchor gives $322.
- **Our ratio rests on 29 companies** and overlapping start years; the two
  eras give $291 and $304.
- **Against us on the other side:** the 2016-2025 window we keep was rich by
  longer history. On the latest year-end multiples the value is $251, an
  Avoid; the fade alone is $193.

## 7. How each review finding changed the value

Two reviewers read draft `631134c` separately: a red-team advocate for the
Buy side (Claude Opus, `red-team` skill; `review/red-team.md`, scripts in
`review/redteam/`) and a model auditor (Codex, `codex exec`, read-only,
reasoning effort xhigh; `review/codex-audit.md`, script
`review/codex_audit.py`, output `review/codex_audit.txt`, run against
`631134c`). Every figure below was rerun by us.

| Finding | Answer | Effect on central fair value |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Red team: the draft's growth-moved anchor predicts realised multiples worse than the unmoved anchor (error 0.553 against 0.460, both eras); the outcome slope is 0.12 (se 0.21); slower growth is charged twice | Accepted. Replaced by the realised ratio for Veeva-like starts (section 2) | +$23.48 ($272.79 to $296.27) |
| Red team: Veeva-like starts realised 0.862x anchor (d) (0.833-0.904 by era) | Accepted; the same change | included above |
| Red team: exit growth 9.1% sits below the Street's path (11.8% against 10.2% FY27-31) | Rejected as an input change: the Street's out-years rest on eight analysts and are not dated evidence; our path times the CRM departures. Disclosed: +1.5 points gives $319 | $0 (disclosed +$22) |
| Auditor: the draft's medians lost the pairing of multiple and growth | Superseded: the slope no longer sets the value | $0 now (+$11.30 on the draft) |
| Auditor: the slope's range and company-effect choices move value $19-26; removing duplicate warrant and alternate listings +$0.43 | Superseded. The Veeva-like rows are 29 operating companies with no warrant or alternate listing | $0 now |
| Auditor: flag 2's bridge omitted the temporary one-point cost-of-equity cut (+$22.15) and split the later −$5.61 wrongly | Fixed in `bridge.py` and the table above | $0 |
| Auditor: flag 4 cited the 2026-10-18 study for the fade-and-outside-view mean, which it did not test | Fixed: the mean is the owner's decision of 2026-10-16 | $0 |
| Both: model, odds, bridge and cash treatment rerun and cleared; stock pay charged once; cash counted once at face | Confirmed | $0 |

Net: $273 to $296. The view stays Hold. The auditor did not rerun after the
change (one round; the call did not change); the replacement ratio was
checked by rerunning the red team's backtest, which reproduced exactly.

## 8. Catalysts, falsifiers and the next results

- 2026-11-05: Investor Day (2030 goal, CRM share, margins).
- Q3 FY27 results, expected late November (not dated by the company): the
  2026-10-15 report's forecasts stand and are graded from that record
  (revenue $962.1M, range $950-972M; non-GAAP operating income $438.5M;
  non-GAAP EPS $2.47). The model is unchanged, so this report adds none. A
  Q3 beat matters for value only if it carries into the FY28 guide: 1.5
  points of growth a year is $22 a share.
- About 2027-03-03: Q4 FY27 results and the FY28 guide.

Falsifiers: FY28 revenue guided at 15% or more, or R&D and Quality holding
near 18% (toward the bull, $468); two or more departing top-20s back on
Vault CRM by 2028; Commercial subscription growth below 5% in any FY28
quarter or an FY28 non-GAAP margin below 43% (toward the bear, $172);
evidence that slowing software leaders keep their full historical multiple
(the method's 48.7x and $322).

## Revision history

| Report | View | Bear | Central | Bull | Central change | Price | Price read at (UTC) | Blinding |
|---|---|---:|---:|---:|---:|---:|---|---|
| 2026-10-15-veev | avoid | 135 | 202 | 264 | first | 313.11 | 2026-10-15T19:59:55Z | partly unblinded |
| 2026-10-26-veev-2 | hold | 172 | 296 | 468 | +94 (+46.5%) | 318.34 | 2026-10-26T17:15:55Z | unblinded |

- 2026-10-26: same forecast; the exit multiple at anchor (d) times what
  Veeva-like starts fetched five years on, replacing the restated Buy
  ($322).

## Sources

- Veeva filings and calls saved with the 2026-10-15 report
  (`../2026-10-15-veev/data/`): 10-K FY26, 10-Qs Q1 and Q2 FY27, 8-K
  exhibits through 2026-08-26, three call transcripts.
- SEC EDGAR filing index via `scripts/research-events.py`, 2026-10-26.
- Veeva news page, read 2026-10-26.
- Market data fiscal-year-end enterprise values, income statements and revenue for
  Veeva, its nine peers (2026-10-26) and the software universe of the
  survivor study (fetched 2026-10-24); the study's own data for the
  realised multiples; `data/`.
- Damodaran implied equity risk premium and the method's risk-free rate
  (2026-10-01).
- After the blind commit 6191a78: market quote, daily bars and analyst
  ratings; market data quote, price targets and estimates (via
  `scripts/research-check.py`); Alpha rank.