Safeguard Financial LLC Increases Stake in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Safeguard Financial LLC lifted its stake in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 14.9% in the 4th quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The firm owned 1,661 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after acquiring an additional 215 shares during the period. Safeguard Financial LLC’s holdings in Visa were worth $525,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently modified their holdings of the stock. Wulff Hansen & CO. raised its position in Visa by 26,951.9% during the 2nd quarter. Wulff Hansen & CO. now owns 1,587,944 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $416,788,000 after buying an additional 1,582,074 shares during the last quarter. WealthPLAN Partners LLC raised its position in Visa by 1.8% during the 2nd quarter. WealthPLAN Partners LLC now owns 14,183 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $3,723,000 after buying an additional 254 shares during the last quarter. Luts & Greenleigh Group Inc. purchased a new position in Visa during the 2nd quarter worth approximately $335,000. Lmcg Investments LLC raised its position in Visa by 1.7% during the 2nd quarter. Lmcg Investments LLC now owns 73,016 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $19,165,000 after buying an additional 1,228 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Excalibur Management Corp raised its position in Visa by 0.9% during the 2nd quarter. Excalibur Management Corp now owns 13,407 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $3,519,000 after buying an additional 120 shares during the last quarter. 82.15% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Visa Trading Up 0.8 %

Shares of V stock opened at $309.24 on Wednesday. The company’s 50-day moving average price is $312.76 and its 200-day moving average price is $287.65. The company has a current ratio of 1.28, a quick ratio of 1.28 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.55. The stock has a market cap of $576.08 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 31.78, a PEG ratio of 2.11 and a beta of 0.96. Visa Inc. has a twelve month low of $252.70 and a twelve month high of $321.61.

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 the consensus estimate 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 net margin of 54.96% and a return on equity of 53.16%. The company’s revenue was up 11.7% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $2.33 EPS. As a group, equities analysts predict that Visa Inc. will post 11.23 earnings per share for the current year.

Visa Increases Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, December 2nd. Investors of record on Tuesday, November 12th were issued a $0.59 dividend. This is a positive change from Visa’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.52. This represents a $2.36 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.76%. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, November 12th. Visa’s payout ratio is 24.25%.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

V has been the subject of several recent research reports. Piper Sandler lifted their target price on shares of Visa from $319.00 to $322.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Oppenheimer lifted their target price on shares of Visa from $321.00 to $375.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, December 19th. TD Cowen lifted their target price on shares of Visa from $318.00 to $325.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Susquehanna lifted their target price on shares of Visa from $339.00 to $375.00 and gave the company a “positive” rating in a report on Wednesday, December 11th. Finally, Macquarie lifted their target price on shares of Visa from $300.00 to $335.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-four have assigned a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Visa currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $331.92.

Insider Activity at Visa

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

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.