Visa (NYSE:V) Trading Up 0.2% – Should You Buy?

Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) shares rose 0.2% during mid-day trading on Wednesday . The stock traded as high as $317.66 and last traded at $316.04. Approximately 3,963,126 shares traded hands during mid-day trading, a decline of 43% from the average daily volume of 6,913,891 shares. The stock had previously closed at $315.31.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of brokerages recently issued reports on V. Oppenheimer increased their price target on shares of Visa from $321.00 to $375.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, December 19th. Bank of America increased their target price on shares of Visa from $279.00 to $308.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Tuesday, September 17th. Piper Sandler lifted their price target on Visa from $319.00 to $322.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. 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. Finally, Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft boosted their price objective on Visa from $300.00 to $340.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-five have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $328.41.

Visa Stock Performance

The stock has a market cap of $585.69 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 32.31, a PEG ratio of 2.11 and a beta of 0.96. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.55, a current ratio of 1.28 and a quick ratio of 1.28. The firm has a fifty day moving average of $308.44 and a 200 day moving average of $285.08.

Visa (NYSE:V) last issued its earnings results on Tuesday, October 29th. The credit-card processor reported $2.71 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.58 by $0.13. Visa had a return on equity of 53.16% and a net margin of 54.96%. The business had revenue of $9.62 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $9.49 billion. During the same period last year, the company earned $2.33 EPS. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 11.7% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, sell-side analysts forecast that Visa Inc. will post 11.23 EPS for the current year.

Visa Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, December 2nd. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, November 12th were paid a dividend of $0.59 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, November 12th. This is an increase from Visa’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.52. This represents a $2.36 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.75%. Visa’s payout ratio is 24.25%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Visa

In related news, insider Paul D. Fabara sold 2,171 shares of the firm’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 completion of the sale, the insider now directly owns 17,894 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $5,510,815.18. This trade represents a 10.82 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. 0.13% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Unionview LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Visa by 1.5% in the 3rd quarter. Unionview LLC now owns 2,296 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $631,000 after acquiring an additional 33 shares during the last quarter. FWG Holdings LLC lifted its stake in Visa by 1.1% during the third quarter. FWG Holdings LLC now owns 3,168 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $900,000 after purchasing an additional 34 shares in the last quarter. St. Louis Trust Co boosted its position in shares of Visa by 0.9% during the third quarter. St. Louis Trust Co now owns 3,885 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $1,068,000 after buying an additional 34 shares during the period. Menard Financial Group LLC grew its stake in shares of Visa by 0.6% in the third quarter. Menard Financial Group LLC now owns 6,217 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $1,709,000 after buying an additional 35 shares in the last quarter. Finally, KMG Fiduciary Partners LLC raised its holdings in shares of Visa by 0.3% in the 3rd quarter. KMG Fiduciary Partners LLC now owns 13,933 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $3,831,000 after buying an additional 37 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 82.15% of the company’s stock.

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.