Argent Capital Management LLC Has $83.14 Million Position in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Argent Capital Management LLC lessened its stake in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 2.0% during the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The institutional investor owned 263,065 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after selling 5,314 shares during the quarter. Visa makes up 2.3% of Argent Capital Management LLC’s holdings, making the stock its 16th largest position. Argent Capital Management LLC’s holdings in Visa were worth $83,139,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Outlook Wealth Advisors LLC raised its stake in shares of Visa by 6.5% during the 4th quarter. Outlook Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 4,491 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $1,419,000 after purchasing an additional 273 shares in the last quarter. Essex Savings Bank increased its holdings in Visa by 1.1% in the fourth quarter. Essex Savings Bank now owns 15,603 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $4,931,000 after buying an additional 174 shares during the last quarter. Sagace Wealth Management LLC raised its position in Visa by 10.5% during the fourth quarter. Sagace Wealth Management LLC now owns 1,737 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $549,000 after acquiring an additional 165 shares in the last quarter. ERn Financial LLC lifted its stake in Visa by 7.4% in the fourth quarter. ERn Financial LLC now owns 5,337 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $1,687,000 after acquiring an additional 368 shares during the last quarter. Finally, BluePath Capital Management LLC grew its position in Visa by 21.1% in the fourth quarter. BluePath Capital Management LLC now owns 4,982 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $1,529,000 after acquiring an additional 868 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 82.15% of the company’s stock.

Insider Buying and Selling at Visa

In related news, insider Paul D. Fabara sold 2,171 shares of Visa stock in a transaction dated Friday, November 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $307.97, for a total value of $668,602.87. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now directly owns 17,894 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $5,510,815.18. The trade was a 10.82 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. Also, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,620 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Thursday, January 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $317.78, for a total transaction of $2,739,263.60. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Company insiders own 0.13% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several research firms recently issued reports on V. Piper Sandler lifted their price objective on shares of Visa from $319.00 to $322.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. TD Cowen upped their price target on Visa from $318.00 to $325.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft raised their price objective on Visa from $300.00 to $340.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. Morgan Stanley upped their target price on Visa from $326.00 to $371.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, December 18th. Finally, Jefferies Financial Group lifted their price target on shares of Visa from $320.00 to $330.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Four research 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 stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $331.92.

Visa Stock Up 0.3 %

NYSE V opened at $317.10 on Friday. Visa Inc. has a 1-year low of $252.70 and a 1-year high of $321.61. The company has a market capitalization of $590.71 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 32.59, a PEG ratio of 2.06 and a beta of 0.96. The stock’s 50 day moving average is $312.94 and its two-hundred day moving average is $287.85. The company has a current ratio of 1.28, a quick ratio of 1.28 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.55.

Visa (NYSE:V) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, October 29th. The credit-card processor reported $2.71 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.58 by $0.13. The firm had revenue of $9.62 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $9.49 billion. Visa had a return on equity of 53.16% and a net margin of 54.96%. The business’s revenue was up 11.7% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the business posted $2.33 earnings per share. Equities analysts forecast that Visa Inc. will post 11.22 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Visa Increases Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, December 2nd. Investors of record on Tuesday, November 12th were issued a dividend of $0.59 per share. This is an increase from Visa’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.52. This represents a $2.36 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.74%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, November 12th. Visa’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 24.25%.

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.