Diversify Advisory Services LLC Trims Stake in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Diversify Advisory Services LLC cut its position in shares of Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 11.8% in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 25,420 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after selling 3,405 shares during the period. Diversify Advisory Services LLC’s holdings in Visa were worth $7,822,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. International Assets Investment Management LLC raised its holdings in shares of Visa by 45,189.4% in the third quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC now owns 9,758,505 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $2,683,101,000 after buying an additional 9,736,958 shares during the period. SG Americas Securities LLC increased its stake in Visa by 4,412.3% in the third quarter. SG Americas Securities LLC now owns 4,072,467 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $1,119,725,000 after purchasing an additional 4,166,905 shares during the period. State Street Corp boosted its stake in shares of Visa by 4.5% during the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 76,610,942 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $21,064,179,000 after purchasing an additional 3,327,977 shares during the period. FMR LLC grew its holdings in shares of Visa by 6.1% in the third quarter. FMR LLC now owns 57,111,843 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $15,702,901,000 after purchasing an additional 3,265,518 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC increased its stake in Visa by 7.7% in the 3rd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 38,655,250 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $10,601,135,000 after buying an additional 2,772,549 shares during the period. 82.15% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,620 shares of the 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 sale 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 business’s stock in a transaction 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 completion of the sale, the insider now directly owns 17,894 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $5,510,815.18. The trade was a 10.82 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 0.13% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Visa Stock Up 1.3 %

Shares of V stock opened at $323.76 on Wednesday. Visa Inc. has a twelve month low of $252.70 and a twelve month high of $324.58. The stock has a market cap of $603.12 billion, a P/E ratio of 33.27, a P/E/G ratio of 2.15 and a beta of 0.96. The stock has a 50 day moving average of $313.59 and a 200 day moving average of $289.09. 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 posted its earnings results on Tuesday, October 29th. The credit-card processor reported $2.71 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.58 by $0.13. The firm had revenue of $9.62 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations 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% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $2.33 EPS. As a group, sell-side analysts expect that Visa Inc. will post 11.2 EPS for the current 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 paid a $0.59 dividend. This represents a $2.36 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.73%. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, November 12th. This is a positive change from Visa’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.52. Visa’s payout ratio is currently 24.25%.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of equities analysts have commented on V shares. Wells Fargo & Company upped their target price on shares of Visa from $325.00 to $360.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Friday, January 3rd. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods increased their price target on Visa from $335.00 to $360.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Monday, December 9th. Susquehanna upped their price objective on shares of Visa from $339.00 to $375.00 and gave the stock a “positive” rating in a research note on Wednesday, December 11th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft raised their target price on shares of Visa from $300.00 to $340.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Finally, Macquarie increased their price objective on shares of Visa from $300.00 to $335.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-four have assigned a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, Visa currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $331.92.

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.