Visa (NYSE:V) Trading Up 0.7% – Still a Buy?

Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) shares shot up 0.7% during trading on Monday . The stock traded as high as $361.89 and last traded at $354.88. 1,736,607 shares were traded during trading, a decline of 76% from the average session volume of 7,148,129 shares. The stock had previously closed at $352.54.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several research firms have commented on V. Seaport Res Ptn raised Visa from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, January 14th. Susquehanna reaffirmed a “positive” rating on shares of Visa in a research note on Friday, March 21st. Oppenheimer reaffirmed an “outperform” rating on shares of Visa in a research note on Thursday, February 13th. Citigroup reaffirmed a “neutral” rating on shares of Visa in a research note on Thursday, February 13th. Finally, Raymond James reissued an “outperform” rating and set a $393.00 price target (up from $374.00) on shares of Visa in a report on Friday, January 31st. Seven research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $362.38.

Visa Stock Up 0.9%

The firm’s 50-day moving average price is $336.98 and its 200 day moving average price is $327.32. The firm has a market capitalization of $661.16 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 35.88, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.33 and a beta of 0.96. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.45, a current ratio of 1.12 and a quick ratio of 1.12.

Visa (NYSE:V) last released its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, April 29th. The credit-card processor reported $2.76 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.68 by $0.08. The business had revenue of $9.59 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $9.57 billion. Visa had a net margin of 54.27% and a return on equity of 54.79%. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 9.3% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the business earned $2.51 earnings per share. Sell-side analysts expect that Visa Inc. will post 11.3 EPS for the current year.

Visa Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, June 2nd. Investors of record on Tuesday, May 13th will be given a dividend of $0.59 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Tuesday, May 13th. This represents a $2.36 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.66%. Visa’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 23.72%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Visa news, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,620 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, March 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $363.00, for a total transaction of $3,129,060.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 537 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $194,931. This trade represents a 94.14% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, insider Paul D. Fabara sold 14,813 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, May 8th. The stock was sold at an average price of $355.04, for a total transaction of $5,259,207.52. Following the transaction, the insider now directly owns 26,413 shares in the company, valued at approximately $9,377,671.52. This represents a 35.93% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last 90 days, insiders have sold 121,948 shares of company stock worth $41,548,282. 0.13% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Visa

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Regent Peak Wealth Advisors LLC boosted its stake in Visa by 2.5% during the 4th quarter. Regent Peak Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 4,927 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $1,557,000 after purchasing an additional 121 shares during the period. RMR Wealth Builders raised its position in shares of Visa by 4.5% during the 4th quarter. RMR Wealth Builders now owns 15,885 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $5,020,000 after buying an additional 677 shares in the last quarter. Czech National Bank raised its holdings in shares of Visa by 10.1% during the fourth quarter. Czech National Bank now owns 374,688 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $118,416,000 after acquiring an additional 34,450 shares during the period. Aprio Wealth Management LLC raised its holdings in shares of Visa by 32.8% during the fourth quarter. Aprio Wealth Management LLC now owns 6,636 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $2,097,000 after acquiring an additional 1,639 shares during the period. Finally, Matrix Trust Co acquired a new stake in shares of Visa during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $161,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 82.15% of the company’s stock.

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.