Visa (NYSE:V) Shares Up 0.8% on Analyst Upgrade

Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) rose 0.8% during mid-day trading on Tuesday after Seaport Res Ptn upgraded the stock from a hold rating to a strong-buy rating. The company traded as high as $309.53 and last traded at $309.26. Approximately 1,391,473 shares traded hands during trading, a decline of 75% from the average daily volume of 5,465,913 shares. The stock had previously closed at $306.92.

V has been the topic of several other research reports. Robert W. Baird increased their target price on Visa from $330.00 to $340.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Oppenheimer raised their price objective on Visa from $321.00 to $375.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Thursday, December 19th. Barclays boosted their target price on shares of Visa from $319.00 to $347.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Monday, November 4th. Citigroup increased their price target on shares of Visa from $326.00 to $354.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday. Finally, Morgan Stanley lifted their price objective on shares of Visa from $326.00 to $371.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, December 18th. Four analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-four have issued a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the company currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $331.92.

Insider Activity at Visa

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

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Peterson Financial Group Inc. acquired a new stake in Visa during the 3rd quarter worth $26,000. Decker Retirement Planning Inc. acquired a new position in Visa during the fourth quarter worth about $26,000. Reston Wealth Management LLC purchased a new stake in Visa during the 3rd quarter valued at about $31,000. Modus Advisors LLC acquired a new stake in Visa in the 4th quarter valued at about $32,000. Finally, West Financial Advisors LLC lifted its stake in Visa by 101.4% in the 3rd quarter. West Financial Advisors LLC now owns 145 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $40,000 after purchasing an additional 73 shares in the last quarter. 82.15% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Visa Price Performance

The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.55, a quick ratio of 1.28 and a current ratio of 1.28. The stock’s 50 day simple moving average is $312.94 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $287.85. The firm has a market capitalization of $590.71 billion, a PE ratio of 32.59, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.06 and a beta of 0.96.

Visa (NYSE:V) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 29th. The credit-card processor reported $2.71 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.58 by $0.13. Visa had a return on equity of 53.16% and a net margin of 54.96%. The company had revenue of $9.62 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $9.49 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $2.33 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 11.7% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, sell-side analysts forecast that Visa Inc. will post 11.22 EPS for the current year.

Visa Increases Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, December 2nd. Investors of record on Tuesday, November 12th were given a dividend of $0.59 per share. This is a boost from Visa’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.52. This represents a $2.36 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.74%. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, November 12th. Visa’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 24.25%.

Visa Company 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.