Visa (NYSE:V) Trading Up 0.6% – Should You Buy?

Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)’s share price traded up 0.6% during mid-day trading on Wednesday . The company traded as high as $348.95 and last traded at $347.22. 1,175,124 shares traded hands during mid-day trading, a decline of 80% from the average session volume of 5,766,767 shares. The stock had previously closed at $345.15.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several equities research analysts recently weighed in on the stock. UBS Group upped their target price on shares of Visa from $350.00 to $400.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, January 31st. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft raised their price target on Visa from $300.00 to $340.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. Mizuho increased their price objective on Visa from $279.00 to $292.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, November 1st. Royal Bank of Canada increased their price target on shares of Visa from $311.00 to $322.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. Finally, Susquehanna upped their target price on shares of Visa from $375.00 to $395.00 and gave the company a “positive” rating in a report on Friday, January 31st. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-five have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $354.73.

Visa Price Performance

The business’s fifty day moving average is $319.07 and its 200 day moving average is $294.37. The company has a market cap of $648.82 billion, a P/E ratio of 35.08, a PEG ratio of 2.30 and a beta of 0.97. 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 (NYSE:V) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, January 30th. The credit-card processor reported $2.75 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.66 by $0.09. Visa had a net margin of 54.27% and a return on equity of 54.79%. As a group, sell-side analysts anticipate that Visa Inc. will post 11.2 EPS for the current year.

Visa Dividend Announcement

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

Insider Activity

In other news, insider Paul D. Fabara sold 2,171 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, November 22nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $307.97, for a total value of $668,602.87. Following the transaction, the insider now directly owns 17,894 shares in the company, valued at approximately $5,510,815.18. This represents a 10.82 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,620 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Thursday, January 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $317.78, for a total transaction of $2,739,263.60. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 21,983 shares of company stock valued at $7,213,146 in the last 90 days. Company insiders own 0.13% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of Visa

Institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of the business. Czech National Bank boosted its holdings in Visa by 13.4% in the third quarter. Czech National Bank now owns 340,238 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $93,548,000 after purchasing an additional 40,268 shares in the last quarter. Security National Bank raised its stake in Visa by 0.4% during the 3rd quarter. Security National Bank now owns 38,642 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $10,625,000 after acquiring an additional 149 shares in the last quarter. Greenfield Savings Bank lifted its position in Visa by 4.7% in the third quarter. Greenfield Savings Bank now owns 5,255 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $1,445,000 after acquiring an additional 235 shares during the last quarter. Versant Capital Management Inc boosted its stake in Visa by 6.8% in the third quarter. Versant Capital Management Inc now owns 3,668 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $1,009,000 after acquiring an additional 234 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Ignite Planners LLC grew its holdings in shares of Visa by 3.6% during the third quarter. Ignite Planners LLC now owns 2,822 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $776,000 after purchasing an additional 97 shares during the last quarter. 82.15% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

About Visa

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.