Maryland State Retirement & Pension System Cuts Position in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Maryland State Retirement & Pension System lessened its holdings in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 6.3% during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The firm owned 85,040 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after selling 5,684 shares during the quarter. Maryland State Retirement & Pension System’s holdings in Visa were worth $26,876,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also bought and sold shares of V. Decker Retirement Planning Inc. purchased a new stake in shares of Visa during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $26,000. Bradley & Co. Private Wealth Management LLC bought a new position in Visa during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $27,000. POM Investment Strategies LLC lifted its position in Visa by 48.5% during the fourth quarter. POM Investment Strategies LLC now owns 98 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $31,000 after purchasing an additional 32 shares during the period. Modus Advisors LLC bought a new position in Visa during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $32,000. Finally, Compass Planning Associates Inc bought a new position in Visa during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $32,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 82.15% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of brokerages recently weighed in on V. Raymond James restated an “outperform” rating and set a $393.00 price objective (up previously from $374.00) on shares of Visa in a research report on Friday, January 31st. Morgan Stanley increased 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. Citigroup restated a “neutral” rating on shares of Visa in a research report on Thursday, February 13th. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods reiterated a “hold” rating on shares of Visa in a research report on Thursday, February 13th. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company increased their price target on shares of Visa from $360.00 to $395.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Friday, January 31st. Seven analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-two have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $353.96.

Visa Stock Performance

V opened at $334.30 on Wednesday. The stock has a market capitalization of $621.06 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 33.70, a PEG ratio of 2.33 and a beta of 0.95. The company has a fifty day moving average of $338.84 and a 200 day moving average of $312.02. Visa Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $252.70 and a fifty-two week high of $366.54. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.45, a quick ratio of 1.12 and a current ratio of 1.12.

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

Visa Announces Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, March 3rd. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, February 11th were paid a $0.59 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, February 11th. This represents a $2.36 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.71%. Visa’s payout ratio is currently 23.79%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, CAO Peter M. Andreski sold 2,332 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, February 7th. The shares were sold at an average price of $349.62, for a total value of $815,313.84. Following the completion of the sale, the chief accounting officer now owns 4,488 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,569,094.56. This trade represents a 34.19 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, insider Paul D. Fabara sold 39,350 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, March 14th. The stock was sold at an average price of $327.20, for a total transaction of $12,875,320.00. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now owns 26,413 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $8,642,333.60. This trade represents a 59.84 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 103,855 shares of company stock valued at $35,165,827 in the last three months. Corporate insiders own 0.13% 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.