Meritage Portfolio Management Invests $306,000 in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Meritage Portfolio Management purchased a new position in shares of Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm purchased 969 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock, valued at approximately $306,000.

A number of other hedge funds also recently modified their holdings of V. C2P Capital Advisory Group LLC d.b.a. Prosperity Capital Advisors grew its holdings in shares of Visa by 4.4% during the third quarter. C2P Capital Advisory Group LLC d.b.a. Prosperity Capital Advisors now owns 1,238 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $340,000 after buying an additional 52 shares in the last quarter. Code Waechter LLC bought a new position in shares of Visa during the third quarter worth about $235,000. Pinnacle Bancorp Inc. grew its holdings in shares of Visa by 16.9% during the third quarter. Pinnacle Bancorp Inc. now owns 16,625 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $4,571,000 after buying an additional 2,398 shares in the last quarter. Watts Gwilliam & Co. LLC bought a new position in shares of Visa during the third quarter worth about $3,265,000. Finally, Westwind Capital grew its holdings in shares of Visa by 726.0% during the third quarter. Westwind Capital now owns 116,917 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $32,146,000 after buying an additional 102,763 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 82.15% of the company’s stock.

Insider Buying and Selling at Visa

In other news, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,620 shares of Visa stock in a transaction on Thursday, January 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $317.78, for a total value of $2,739,263.60. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, CAO Peter M. Andreski sold 2,332 shares of Visa stock in a transaction on Friday, February 7th. The shares were sold at an average price of $349.62, for a total value of $815,313.84. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief accounting officer now owns 4,488 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,569,094.56. The trade was a 34.19 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 58,056 shares of company stock valued at $19,830,050 in the last three months. Corporate insiders own 0.13% of the company’s stock.

Visa Stock Performance

NYSE:V opened at $348.26 on Friday. The stock has a market cap of $648.77 billion, a P/E ratio of 35.11, a PEG ratio of 2.30 and a beta of 0.97. The stock has a 50 day simple moving average of $320.41 and a 200 day simple moving average of $295.12. The company has a current ratio of 1.12, a quick ratio of 1.28 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.45. Visa Inc. has a 1-year low of $252.70 and a 1-year high of $351.25.

Visa (NYSE:V) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, January 30th. The credit-card processor reported $2.75 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.66 by $0.09. Visa had a return on equity of 54.79% and a net margin of 54.27%. Research analysts anticipate that Visa Inc. will post 11.2 earnings per share for the current year.

Visa Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, March 3rd. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, February 11th will be issued a $0.59 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Tuesday, February 11th. This represents a $2.36 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.68%. Visa’s dividend payout ratio is presently 23.79%.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of research analysts have weighed in on the company. Piper Sandler restated an “overweight” rating and issued a $383.00 price target (up from $368.00) on shares of Visa in a research note on Friday, January 31st. Jefferies Financial Group raised their price target on Visa from $320.00 to $330.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. Mizuho raised their price target on Visa from $279.00 to $292.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Friday, November 1st. Susquehanna raised their price target on Visa from $375.00 to $395.00 and gave the company a “positive” rating in a research note on Friday, January 31st. Finally, Citigroup raised their price target on Visa from $354.00 to $393.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, January 31st. Four research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-five have assigned a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $354.73.

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.