Visa (NYSE:V) Trading 0.3% Higher – Should You Buy?

Shares of Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) rose 0.3% during mid-day trading on Thursday . The stock traded as high as $319.68 and last traded at $316.88. Approximately 1,176,572 shares changed hands during mid-day trading, a decline of 83% from the average daily volume of 6,913,891 shares. The stock had previously closed at $316.04.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several equities analysts have recently weighed in on V shares. Macquarie raised their price objective on Visa from $300.00 to $335.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft boosted their price target on Visa from $300.00 to $340.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Barclays raised their price objective on Visa from $319.00 to $347.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Monday, November 4th. Morgan Stanley boosted their target price on Visa from $326.00 to $371.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Wednesday, December 18th. Finally, Monness Crespi & Hardt reaffirmed a “neutral” rating on shares of Visa in a research report on Tuesday, September 24th. Four research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-five have assigned a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $329.70.

Visa Price Performance

The business has a 50-day moving average price of $309.73 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $285.59. 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 company has a market capitalization of $586.64 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 32.36, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.11 and a beta of 0.96.

Visa (NYSE:V) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 29th. The credit-card processor reported $2.71 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.58 by $0.13. The firm had revenue of $9.62 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $9.49 billion. Visa had a net margin of 54.96% and a return on equity of 53.16%. The business’s revenue was up 11.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company posted $2.33 earnings per share. As a group, research analysts anticipate that Visa Inc. will post 11.23 EPS for the current year.

Visa Increases Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, December 2nd. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, November 12th were issued a $0.59 dividend. This represents a $2.36 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.75%. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, November 12th. This is a positive change from Visa’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.52. Visa’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 24.25%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Visa news, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,620 shares of Visa stock in a transaction dated Thursday, January 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $317.78, for a total value of $2,739,263.60. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through this link. Also, insider Paul D. Fabara sold 2,171 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, November 22nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $307.97, for a total transaction of $668,602.87. Following the transaction, the insider now directly owns 17,894 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $5,510,815.18. This represents a 10.82 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 0.13% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Visa

Several institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of the company. Peterson Financial Group Inc. purchased a new stake in Visa during the third quarter valued at about $26,000. Modus Advisors LLC bought a new position in Visa during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $32,000. Reston Wealth Management LLC purchased a new position in shares of Visa during the third quarter worth approximately $31,000. West Financial Advisors LLC grew its holdings in shares of Visa by 101.4% during the 3rd quarter. West Financial Advisors LLC now owns 145 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $40,000 after purchasing an additional 73 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Fairway Wealth LLC bought a new stake in shares of Visa in the 2nd quarter valued at about $39,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 82.15% of the company’s stock.

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.