Vanguard Group Inc. Acquires 7,079,706 Shares of Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its stake in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 4.6% in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 159,405,343 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after buying an additional 7,079,706 shares during the period. Visa makes up approximately 0.9% of Vanguard Group Inc.’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 13th biggest position. Vanguard Group Inc. owned about 8.58% of Visa worth $50,378,465,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors have also made changes to their positions in the company. Riverstone Advisors LLC bought a new position in shares of Visa in the 4th quarter valued at $217,000. Journey Strategic Wealth LLC boosted its stake in shares of Visa by 16.4% in the 4th quarter. Journey Strategic Wealth LLC now owns 9,678 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $3,058,000 after purchasing an additional 1,361 shares in the last quarter. King Wealth Management Group grew its holdings in shares of Visa by 9.0% during the 4th quarter. King Wealth Management Group now owns 74,874 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $23,663,000 after purchasing an additional 6,172 shares during the last quarter. Generali Investments CEE investicni spolecnost a.s. acquired a new position in Visa during the 4th quarter worth approximately $10,163,000. Finally, Copley Financial Group Inc. bought a new position in Visa in the 3rd quarter valued at approximately $616,000. 82.15% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several research firms recently weighed in on V. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised their price objective on Visa from $340.00 to $375.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Friday, January 31st. Wells Fargo & Company upped their price objective on Visa from $360.00 to $395.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Friday, January 31st. Bank of America lifted their target price on shares of Visa from $331.00 to $363.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, January 31st. Susquehanna restated a “positive” rating on shares of Visa in a research report on Friday. Finally, Morgan Stanley raised their price target on shares of Visa from $326.00 to $371.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, December 18th. Six equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-three have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $353.96.

Visa Price Performance

Shares of NYSE:V opened at $336.51 on Friday. The company has a market capitalization of $625.15 billion, a P/E ratio of 33.92, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.33 and a beta of 0.95. The company’s 50-day moving average is $340.48 and its 200 day moving average is $313.06. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.45, a quick ratio of 1.12 and a current ratio of 1.12. Visa Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $252.70 and a fifty-two week high of $366.54.

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%. On average, equities research analysts forecast that Visa Inc. will post 11.3 earnings per share for the current year.

Visa Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, March 3rd. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, February 11th were given a $0.59 dividend. This represents a $2.36 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.70%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, February 11th. Visa’s dividend payout ratio is currently 23.79%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Visa

In other news, General Counsel Julie B. Rottenberg sold 2,572 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Monday, February 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $340.00, for a total transaction of $874,480.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the general counsel now directly owns 11,925 shares in the company, valued at $4,054,500. The trade was a 17.74 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. Also, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,620 shares of the stock in a transaction on Thursday, January 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $317.78, for a total value of $2,739,263.60. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 143,205 shares of company stock worth $48,560,961 over the last ninety days. 0.13% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

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.