Saybrook Capital NC Lowers Stock Holdings in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Saybrook Capital NC reduced its stake in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 0.7% during the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The fund owned 65,794 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after selling 492 shares during the period. Visa makes up about 5.6% of Saybrook Capital NC’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 6th largest position. Saybrook Capital NC’s holdings in Visa were worth $20,794,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently made changes to their positions in V. SLT Holdings LLC acquired a new position in Visa in the 4th quarter valued at $210,000. Sowell Financial Services LLC raised its holdings in Visa by 33.7% in the 4th quarter. Sowell Financial Services LLC now owns 41,723 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $13,186,000 after acquiring an additional 10,506 shares in the last quarter. Dundas Partners LLP raised its holdings in Visa by 9.0% in the 4th quarter. Dundas Partners LLP now owns 175,029 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $55,316,000 after acquiring an additional 14,504 shares in the last quarter. Miramar Capital LLC raised its holdings in Visa by 0.3% in the 4th quarter. Miramar Capital LLC now owns 41,855 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $13,228,000 after acquiring an additional 132 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Argentarii LLC acquired a new position in Visa in the 4th quarter valued at $3,559,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 82.15% of the company’s stock.

Insider Buying and Selling at Visa

In other Visa news, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,620 shares of the stock in a transaction 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 document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, CAO Peter M. Andreski sold 2,332 shares of the 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 transaction, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 4,488 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,569,094.56. This trade represents a 34.19 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last ninety days, insiders sold 64,505 shares of company stock valued at $22,290,507. Company insiders own 0.13% of the company’s stock.

Visa Stock Performance

Shares of V opened at $345.79 on Friday. The company has a current ratio of 1.12, a quick ratio of 1.12 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.45. The company has a market capitalization of $642.41 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 34.86, a PEG ratio of 2.33 and a beta of 0.95. The stock has a 50 day moving average of $336.18 and a 200 day moving average of $308.63. Visa Inc. has a 12 month low of $252.70 and a 12 month high of $366.54.

Visa (NYSE:V) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, January 30th. The credit-card processor reported $2.75 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.66 by $0.09. Visa had a return on equity of 54.79% and a net margin of 54.27%. As a group, sell-side analysts forecast that Visa Inc. will post 11.3 earnings per share for the current year.

Visa Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, March 3rd. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, February 11th were issued a dividend of $0.59 per share. This represents a $2.36 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.68%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, February 11th. Visa’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 23.79%.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several brokerages have weighed in on V. Citigroup reaffirmed a “neutral” rating on shares of Visa in a report on Thursday, February 13th. Oppenheimer reaffirmed an “outperform” rating on shares of Visa in a report on Thursday, February 13th. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods reissued a “hold” rating on shares of Visa in a report on Thursday, February 13th. Raymond James reissued an “outperform” rating and set a $393.00 price target (up previously from $374.00) on shares of Visa in a report on Friday, January 31st. Finally, Bank of America boosted their price target on Visa from $331.00 to $363.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, January 31st. Six research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-three have given a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $353.96.

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.