Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) Given Average Rating of “Moderate Buy” by Brokerages

Shares of Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) have earned a consensus recommendation of “Moderate Buy” from the twenty-nine brokerages that are currently covering the company, MarketBeat reports. Six equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-two have given a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating on the company. The average 1-year target price among brokerages that have covered the stock in the last year is $353.96.

A number of equities research analysts have recently issued reports on V shares. Bank of America upped their price target on Visa from $331.00 to $363.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, January 31st. Piper Sandler restated an “overweight” rating and issued a $383.00 price target (up from $368.00) on shares of Visa in a research report on Friday, January 31st. William Blair restated an “outperform” rating on shares of Visa in a research report on Friday, January 31st. Morgan Stanley upped their price target on Visa from $326.00 to $371.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, December 18th. Finally, Raymond James restated an “outperform” rating and issued a $393.00 price target (up from $374.00) on shares of Visa in a research report on Friday, January 31st.

Visa Price Performance

NYSE:V opened at $361.60 on Tuesday. Visa has a 12 month low of $252.70 and a 12 month high of $366.54. The stock has a 50 day moving average of $333.92 and a two-hundred day moving average of $306.64. The company has a current ratio of 1.12, a quick ratio of 1.12 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.45. The firm has a market cap of $671.77 billion, a P/E ratio of 36.45, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.33 and a beta of 0.97.

Visa (NYSE:V) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, January 30th. The credit-card processor reported $2.75 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.66 by $0.09. Visa had a return on equity of 54.79% and a net margin of 54.27%. On average, analysts expect that Visa will post 11.3 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Visa Dividend Announcement

The business 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 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.65%. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, February 11th. Visa’s payout ratio is currently 23.79%.

Insider Activity

In other news, CAO Peter M. Andreski sold 2,332 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, February 7th. The stock was sold at an average price of $349.62, for a total value of $815,313.84. Following the sale, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 4,488 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,569,094.56. This trade represents a 34.19 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, General Counsel Julie B. Rottenberg sold 2,572 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, February 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $340.00, for a total value of $874,480.00. Following the completion of the sale, the general counsel now owns 11,925 shares in the company, valued at approximately $4,054,500. The trade was a 17.74 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last three months, insiders have sold 55,885 shares of company stock worth $19,161,447. Corporate insiders own 0.13% of the company’s stock.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Visa

Several large investors have recently bought and sold shares of the business. Vanguard Group Inc. increased its holdings in Visa by 4.6% in the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 159,405,343 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $50,378,465,000 after buying an additional 7,079,706 shares during the last quarter. State Street Corp increased its holdings in Visa by 4.5% in 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 buying an additional 3,327,977 shares during the last quarter. FMR LLC increased its holdings in Visa by 6.1% in the third quarter. FMR LLC now owns 57,111,843 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $15,702,901,000 after buying an additional 3,265,518 shares during the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC grew its holdings in shares of Visa by 4.4% during the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 40,345,176 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $12,729,901,000 after purchasing an additional 1,689,926 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Capital International Investors grew its holdings in shares of Visa by 3.8% during the fourth quarter. Capital International Investors now owns 23,816,573 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $7,526,660,000 after purchasing an additional 866,596 shares during the last quarter. 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.