Westwind Capital Cuts Stock Position in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Westwind Capital lowered its position in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 1.0% during the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The firm owned 115,701 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after selling 1,216 shares during the quarter. Visa accounts for about 7.9% of Westwind Capital’s investment portfolio, making the stock its biggest position. Westwind Capital’s holdings in Visa were worth $36,566,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also made changes to their positions in the business. International Assets Investment Management LLC boosted its stake in Visa by 45,189.4% during the 3rd quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC now owns 9,758,505 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $2,683,101,000 after purchasing an additional 9,736,958 shares in the last quarter. SG Americas Securities LLC grew its stake in shares of Visa by 4,412.3% in the 3rd quarter. SG Americas Securities LLC now owns 4,072,467 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $1,119,725,000 after purchasing an additional 4,166,905 shares during the last quarter. State Street Corp raised its holdings in shares of Visa by 4.5% in the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 76,610,942 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $21,064,179,000 after purchasing an additional 3,327,977 shares in the last quarter. FMR LLC grew its position in Visa by 6.1% in the third quarter. FMR LLC now owns 57,111,843 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $15,702,901,000 after buying an additional 3,265,518 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC increased its holdings in shares of Visa by 7.7% in the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 38,655,250 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $10,601,135,000 after buying an additional 2,772,549 shares in the last quarter. 82.15% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of equities analysts recently weighed in on V shares. Barclays lifted their price target on Visa from $319.00 to $347.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, November 4th. Susquehanna upped their price target on shares of Visa from $339.00 to $375.00 and gave the company a “positive” rating in a research report on Wednesday, December 11th. Wells Fargo & Company boosted their target price on shares of Visa from $325.00 to $360.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Friday. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft raised their target price on Visa from $300.00 to $340.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Finally, Morgan Stanley raised their price objective on Visa from $326.00 to $371.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, December 18th. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-five have assigned a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Visa currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $329.70.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,620 shares of Visa stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, January 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $317.78, for a total value of $2,739,263.60. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, insider Paul D. Fabara sold 2,171 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Friday, November 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $307.97, for a total transaction of $668,602.87. Following the transaction, the insider now owns 17,894 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $5,510,815.18. This represents a 10.82 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Corporate insiders own 0.13% of the company’s stock.

Visa Trading Down 0.4 %

Shares of Visa stock traded down $1.17 on Tuesday, hitting $311.87. 3,232,056 shares of the company’s stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 4,800,548. The firm’s 50-day moving average price is $310.30 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $286.01. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.55, a current ratio of 1.28 and a quick ratio of 1.28. The stock has a market capitalization of $580.97 billion, a PE ratio of 32.05, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.11 and a beta of 0.96. Visa Inc. has a one year low of $252.70 and a one year high of $321.61.

Visa (NYSE:V) last released its earnings results on Tuesday, October 29th. The credit-card processor reported $2.71 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.58 by $0.13. The firm had revenue of $9.62 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $9.49 billion. Visa had a return on equity of 53.16% and a net margin of 54.96%. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 11.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm posted $2.33 earnings per share. On average, research analysts expect that Visa Inc. will post 11.23 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Visa Increases Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, December 2nd. Investors of record on Tuesday, November 12th were paid a dividend of $0.59 per share. This represents a $2.36 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.76%. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, November 12th. This is an increase from Visa’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.52. Visa’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 24.25%.

Visa Profile

Visa Inc operates as a payment technology company in the United States and internationally. The company operates VisaNet, a transaction processing network that enables authorization, clearing, and settlement of payment transactions. It also offers credit, debit, and prepaid card products; tap to pay, tokenization, and click to pay services; Visa Direct, a solution that facilitates the delivery of funds to eligible cards, deposit accounts, and digital wallets; Visa B2B Connect, a multilateral business-to-business cross-border payments network; Visa Cross-Border Solution, a cross-border consumer payments solution; and Visa DPS that provides a range of value-added services, including fraud mitigation, dispute management, data analytics, campaign management, a suite of digital solutions, and contact center services.