Brown Brothers Harriman & Co. Buys 15,356 Shares of Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Brown Brothers Harriman & Co. raised its position in shares of Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 17.3% in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 104,065 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after purchasing an additional 15,356 shares during the period. Brown Brothers Harriman & Co.’s holdings in Visa were worth $32,889,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Other large investors have also bought and sold shares of the company. Hirtle Callaghan & Co LLC lifted its stake in shares of Visa by 1.3% during the 4th quarter. Hirtle Callaghan & Co LLC now owns 2,291 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $724,000 after acquiring an additional 29 shares during the last quarter. Elevation Wealth Partners LLC grew its position in Visa by 3.3% in the 4th quarter. Elevation Wealth Partners LLC now owns 939 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $297,000 after acquiring an additional 30 shares during the last quarter. Warther Private Wealth LLC increased its stake in Visa by 1.0% in the fourth quarter. Warther Private Wealth LLC now owns 2,935 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $928,000 after purchasing an additional 30 shares during the period. Valmark Advisers Inc. lifted its position in shares of Visa by 0.4% during the fourth quarter. Valmark Advisers Inc. now owns 7,251 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $2,292,000 after purchasing an additional 30 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Strategic Family Wealth Counselors L.L.C. boosted its stake in shares of Visa by 0.4% during the fourth quarter. Strategic Family Wealth Counselors L.L.C. now owns 7,283 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $2,302,000 after purchasing an additional 30 shares during the period. 82.15% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

V has been the topic of several recent analyst reports. Seaport Res Ptn raised shares of Visa from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, January 14th. Barclays lifted their price target on shares of Visa from $361.00 to $396.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, February 3rd. StockNews.com upgraded Visa from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Friday. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their target price on Visa from $360.00 to $395.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Friday, January 31st. Finally, Keefe, Bruyette & Woods reiterated a “hold” rating on shares of Visa in a report on Thursday, February 13th. Five investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-three have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $355.84.

Insider Transactions at Visa

In other news, General Counsel Julie B. Rottenberg sold 2,572 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, February 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $340.00, for a total value of $874,480.00. Following the sale, the general counsel now owns 11,925 shares in the company, valued at $4,054,500. This represents a 17.74 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, CAO Peter M. Andreski sold 2,332 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, February 7th. The stock was sold at an average price of $349.62, for a total value of $815,313.84. Following the sale, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 4,488 shares in the company, 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. Insiders sold a total of 143,205 shares of company stock worth $48,560,961 over the last three months. 0.13% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Visa Stock Performance

Shares of Visa stock opened at $342.62 on Friday. The firm has a market capitalization of $636.51 billion, a P/E ratio of 34.54, a PEG ratio of 2.33 and a beta of 0.95. Visa Inc. has a 52 week low of $252.70 and a 52 week high of $366.54. The company has a quick ratio of 1.12, a current ratio of 1.12 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.45. The company has a 50 day moving average price of $343.60 and a 200 day moving average price of $315.06.

Visa (NYSE:V) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, January 30th. The credit-card processor reported $2.75 EPS for the quarter, topping 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%. Sell-side analysts expect that Visa Inc. will post 11.3 EPS for the current year.

Visa Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, March 3rd. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, February 11th were issued a $0.59 dividend. This represents a $2.36 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.69%. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, February 11th. Visa’s dividend payout ratio is presently 23.79%.

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.