MCF Advisors LLC Boosts Holdings in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

MCF Advisors LLC increased its stake in shares of Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 2.7% in the fourth quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The fund owned 10,487 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after buying an additional 275 shares during the period. MCF Advisors LLC’s holdings in Visa were worth $3,314,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other large investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Peterson Financial Group Inc. bought a new position in Visa during the third quarter worth about $26,000. Decker Retirement Planning Inc. bought a new position in Visa during the fourth quarter worth about $26,000. Reston Wealth Management LLC bought a new position in Visa during the third quarter worth about $31,000. Modus Advisors LLC bought a new position in Visa during the fourth quarter worth about $32,000. Finally, West Financial Advisors LLC boosted its position in Visa by 101.4% during the third quarter. West Financial Advisors LLC now owns 145 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $40,000 after purchasing an additional 73 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 82.15% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

V has been the subject of a number of research reports. Mizuho increased their target price on shares of Visa from $279.00 to $292.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, November 1st. Macquarie raised their price objective on shares of Visa from $300.00 to $335.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft raised their price objective 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. Robert W. Baird raised their price objective on shares of Visa from $330.00 to $340.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Finally, Morgan Stanley raised their price objective on shares of Visa from $326.00 to $371.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, December 18th. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-four have assigned a buy rating and two have 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 $332.81.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,620 shares of Visa stock in a transaction on Thursday, January 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $317.78, for a total value of $2,739,263.60. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Also, insider Paul D. Fabara sold 2,171 shares of Visa stock in a transaction on Friday, November 22nd. The shares were 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 owns 17,894 shares in the company, valued at approximately $5,510,815.18. This trade represents a 10.82 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 0.13% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Visa Trading Up 1.4 %

V stock opened at $328.18 on Friday. The company has a market capitalization of $611.36 billion, a PE ratio of 33.73, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.17 and a beta of 0.96. Visa Inc. has a one year low of $252.70 and a one year high of $328.51. The company’s 50 day moving average price is $314.14 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $289.71. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.55, a quick ratio of 1.28 and a current ratio of 1.28.

Visa (NYSE:V) last issued its earnings results on Tuesday, October 29th. The credit-card processor reported $2.71 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.58 by $0.13. Visa had a net margin of 54.96% and a return on equity of 53.16%. The company had revenue of $9.62 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $9.49 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $2.33 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 11.7% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, analysts predict that Visa Inc. will post 11.2 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Visa Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced 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 0.72%. This is an increase from Visa’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.52. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, November 12th. Visa’s payout ratio is presently 24.25%.

Visa 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.