Claro Advisors LLC Increases Holdings in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Claro Advisors LLC increased its stake in shares of Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 1.7% during the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The fund owned 9,350 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after purchasing an additional 156 shares during the quarter. Claro Advisors LLC’s holdings in Visa were worth $2,955,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently bought and sold shares of the stock. State Street Corp grew its holdings in Visa by 4.5% during the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 76,610,942 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $21,064,179,000 after acquiring an additional 3,327,977 shares during the period. FMR LLC grew 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 purchasing an additional 3,265,518 shares during the period. Geode Capital Management LLC grew its holdings in Visa by 7.7% in the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 38,655,250 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $10,601,135,000 after purchasing an additional 2,772,549 shares during the period. Ameriprise Financial Inc. grew its holdings in Visa by 2.4% in the second quarter. Ameriprise Financial Inc. now owns 14,610,590 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $3,833,981,000 after purchasing an additional 345,829 shares during the period. Finally, Legal & General Group Plc grew its holdings in Visa by 2.2% in the second quarter. Legal & General Group Plc now owns 14,416,394 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $3,783,857,000 after purchasing an additional 312,286 shares during the period. 82.15% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several brokerages have commented on V. Morgan Stanley raised their price objective on Visa from $326.00 to $371.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Wednesday, December 18th. Jefferies Financial Group raised their price objective on Visa from $320.00 to $330.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. TD Cowen raised their price objective on Visa from $318.00 to $325.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft raised their target price on Visa from $300.00 to $340.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Finally, Oppenheimer raised their target price on Visa from $321.00 to $375.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Thursday, December 19th. Four research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-four have issued a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $330.85.

Insider Activity

In related news, 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 transaction, the insider now directly owns 17,894 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $5,510,815.18. The trade was a 10.82 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,620 shares of the business’s 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 own 0.13% of the company’s stock.

Visa Price Performance

NYSE:V opened at $306.59 on Tuesday. Visa Inc. has a 52 week low of $252.70 and a 52 week high of $321.61. The company has a quick ratio of 1.28, a current ratio of 1.28 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.55. The company has a market capitalization of $571.14 billion, a P/E ratio of 31.51, a P/E/G ratio of 2.11 and a beta of 0.96. The stock’s fifty day moving average is $312.44 and its two-hundred day moving average is $287.32.

Visa (NYSE:V) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 29th. The credit-card processor reported $2.71 earnings per share for the quarter, beating 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 analysts’ expectations of $9.49 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $2.33 earnings per share. The company’s revenue was up 11.7% on a year-over-year basis. Equities analysts expect that Visa Inc. will post 11.23 EPS for the current year.

Visa Increases Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, December 2nd. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, November 12th were paid a $0.59 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, November 12th. This is a boost from Visa’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.52. This represents a $2.36 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.77%. Visa’s payout ratio is presently 24.25%.

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.