Mercer Global Advisors Inc. ADV Buys 31,254 Shares of Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Mercer Global Advisors Inc. ADV lifted its stake in shares of Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 12.1% during the second quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 289,992 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after purchasing an additional 31,254 shares during the quarter. Mercer Global Advisors Inc. ADV’s holdings in Visa were worth $76,114,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in V. Livelsberger Financial Advisory acquired a new position in shares of Visa during the fourth quarter valued at about $25,000. Westend Capital Management LLC acquired a new position in Visa during the 1st quarter valued at about $25,000. POM Investment Strategies LLC increased its holdings in Visa by 970.0% during the 2nd quarter. POM Investment Strategies LLC now owns 107 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $28,000 after purchasing an additional 97 shares in the last quarter. Frank Rimerman Advisors LLC bought a new stake in Visa during the 4th quarter worth approximately $33,000. Finally, TruNorth Capital Management LLC raised its stake in shares of Visa by 211.9% in the second quarter. TruNorth Capital Management LLC now owns 131 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $34,000 after purchasing an additional 89 shares during the last quarter. 82.15% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities research analysts recently commented on V shares. Evercore ISI lowered their price target on Visa from $335.00 to $330.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Tuesday, June 25th. TD Cowen lowered their target price on shares of Visa from $320.00 to $318.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, July 24th. The Goldman Sachs Group restated a “buy” rating and set a $317.00 price target on shares of Visa in a report on Thursday, September 12th. Citigroup decreased their price objective on shares of Visa from $321.00 to $319.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, July 24th. Finally, StockNews.com upgraded Visa from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, August 9th. Six analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-four have issued a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, Visa has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $310.22.

Visa Stock Up 0.4 %

V opened at $291.61 on Wednesday. The company has a 50 day moving average of $269.30 and a 200 day moving average of $273.27. The company has a current ratio of 1.37, a quick ratio of 1.37 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.54. Visa Inc. has a 12 month low of $227.78 and a 12 month high of $293.07. The company has a market cap of $533.34 billion, a PE ratio of 32.58, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.01 and a beta of 0.96.

Visa (NYSE:V) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, July 23rd. The credit-card processor reported $2.42 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, meeting analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.42. Visa had a return on equity of 51.94% and a net margin of 54.72%. The company had revenue of $8.90 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $8.92 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $2.16 EPS. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 9.6% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, sell-side analysts expect that Visa Inc. will post 9.92 EPS for the current year.

Visa Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, September 3rd. Investors of record on Friday, August 9th were paid a dividend of $0.52 per share. The ex-dividend date was Friday, August 9th. This represents a $2.08 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.71%. Visa’s dividend payout ratio is currently 23.24%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,620 shares of Visa stock in a transaction on Tuesday, September 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $276.37, for a total transaction of $2,382,309.40. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 538 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $148,687.06. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. Corporate insiders own 0.19% of the company’s stock.

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.