Argent Advisors Inc. Buys 65 Shares of Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Argent Advisors Inc. increased its stake in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 1.0% in the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The institutional investor owned 6,289 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after acquiring an additional 65 shares during the period. Argent Advisors Inc.’s holdings in Visa were worth $1,988,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other institutional investors also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Decker Retirement Planning Inc. bought a new position in shares of Visa during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $26,000. Bradley & Co. Private Wealth Management LLC bought a new position in shares of Visa during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $27,000. Peterson Financial Group Inc. bought a new position in shares of Visa during the third quarter valued at approximately $26,000. POM Investment Strategies LLC increased its stake in shares of Visa by 48.5% during the fourth quarter. POM Investment Strategies LLC now owns 98 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $31,000 after purchasing an additional 32 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Modus Advisors LLC bought a new position in shares of Visa during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $32,000. 82.15% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Insider Transactions at Visa

In other news, insider Paul D. Fabara sold 39,350 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, March 14th. The stock was sold at an average price of $327.20, for a total value of $12,875,320.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now owns 26,413 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $8,642,333.60. This represents a 59.84 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, insider Tullier Kelly Mahon sold 33,741 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, February 7th. The stock was sold at an average price of $349.77, for a total value of $11,801,589.57. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now directly owns 36,566 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $12,789,689.82. This trade represents a 47.99 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 103,855 shares of company stock valued at $35,165,827 over the last 90 days. Company insiders own 0.13% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of research firms have recently commented on V. William Blair reiterated an “outperform” rating on shares of Visa in a report on Friday, January 31st. Oppenheimer reiterated an “outperform” rating on shares of Visa in a report on Thursday, February 13th. Seaport Res Ptn upgraded shares of Visa from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, January 14th. UBS Group increased their price target on shares of Visa from $350.00 to $400.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, January 31st. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company increased their price target on shares of Visa from $360.00 to $395.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Friday, January 31st. Seven investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-two have given a buy rating and one has issued 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 price target of $353.96.

Visa Trading Up 0.8 %

Shares of Visa stock opened at $334.35 on Tuesday. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $338.39 and its 200-day simple moving average is $311.61. The stock has a market capitalization of $621.15 billion, a PE ratio of 33.70, a P/E/G ratio of 2.33 and a beta of 0.95. Visa Inc. has a 1-year low of $252.70 and a 1-year high of $366.54. 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 earnings results on Thursday, January 30th. The credit-card processor reported $2.75 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.66 by $0.09. Visa had a net margin of 54.27% and a return on equity of 54.79%. As a group, equities analysts anticipate that Visa Inc. will post 11.3 earnings per share for the current year.

Visa Announces Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, March 3rd. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, February 11th were paid a $0.59 dividend. This represents a $2.36 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.71%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, February 11th. Visa’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 23.79%.

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.