Visa (NYSE:V) Trading Up 0.9% – Still a Buy?

Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) traded up 0.9% during trading on Monday . The stock traded as high as $320.59 and last traded at $319.97. 5,746,152 shares traded hands during trading, an increase of 1% from the average session volume of 5,703,089 shares. The stock had previously closed at $317.25.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several analysts recently commented on the company. Oppenheimer raised their target price on Visa from $321.00 to $375.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, December 19th. Macquarie lifted their target price on shares of Visa from $300.00 to $335.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. BMO Capital Markets increased their price target on shares of Visa from $310.00 to $320.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Monness Crespi & Hardt reaffirmed a “neutral” rating on shares of Visa in a report on Tuesday, September 24th. Finally, Morgan Stanley increased their target price on shares of Visa from $326.00 to $371.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, December 18th. Four analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-four have issued a buy rating and two have given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Visa currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $331.92.

Visa Stock Up 1.3 %

The company has a quick ratio of 1.28, a current ratio of 1.28 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.55. The stock has a market cap of $603.12 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 33.27, a PEG ratio of 2.15 and a beta of 0.96. The business’s fifty day moving average is $313.59 and its two-hundred day moving average is $289.09.

Visa (NYSE:V) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, October 29th. The credit-card processor reported $2.71 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.58 by $0.13. Visa had a net margin of 54.96% and a return on equity of 53.16%. The company had revenue of $9.62 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $9.49 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $2.33 earnings per share. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 11.7% on a year-over-year basis. Equities analysts forecast that Visa Inc. will post 11.2 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Visa Increases Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, December 2nd. Investors of record on Tuesday, November 12th were issued a $0.59 dividend. This represents a $2.36 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.73%. This is an increase from Visa’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.52. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, November 12th. Visa’s dividend payout ratio is 24.25%.

Insider Activity at Visa

In other Visa news, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,620 shares of Visa stock in a transaction that occurred 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 transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Also, insider Paul D. Fabara sold 2,171 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, November 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $307.97, for a total transaction of $668,602.87. Following the transaction, the insider now owns 17,894 shares in the company, valued at approximately $5,510,815.18. This trade represents a 10.82 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders own 0.13% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of V. Peterson Financial Group Inc. purchased a new stake in Visa in the 3rd quarter valued at approximately $26,000. Decker Retirement Planning Inc. purchased a new stake in shares of Visa during the 4th quarter worth $26,000. Reston Wealth Management LLC acquired a new position in shares of Visa during the 3rd quarter worth $31,000. Modus Advisors LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Visa in the fourth quarter valued at about $32,000. Finally, West Financial Advisors LLC grew its position in Visa by 101.4% during the third quarter. West Financial Advisors LLC now owns 145 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $40,000 after buying an additional 73 shares during the period. 82.15% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Visa Company 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.