Sandy Spring Bank Has $13.87 Million Stake in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Sandy Spring Bank decreased its stake in shares of Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 2.2% during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the SEC. The fund owned 43,900 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after selling 975 shares during the period. Sandy Spring Bank’s holdings in Visa were worth $13,874,000 as of its most recent filing with the SEC.

A number of other hedge funds have also made changes to their positions in the stock. Raymond James Financial Inc. acquired a new stake in Visa in the 4th quarter valued at approximately $1,955,403,000. Proficio Capital Partners LLC grew its holdings in Visa by 17,018.7% in the 4th quarter. Proficio Capital Partners LLC now owns 3,949,118 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $1,248,079,000 after buying an additional 3,926,049 shares during the last quarter. State Street Corp grew its holdings in Visa by 4.5% in the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 76,610,942 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $21,064,179,000 after buying an additional 3,327,977 shares during the last quarter. FMR LLC grew its holdings in Visa by 6.1% in the 3rd quarter. FMR LLC now owns 57,111,843 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $15,702,901,000 after buying an additional 3,265,518 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC grew its holdings in Visa by 7.7% in the 3rd 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 buying an additional 2,772,549 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 82.15% of the company’s stock.

Visa Trading Up 1.5 %

Shares of V opened at $339.92 on Thursday. The stock has a fifty day moving average price of $339.38 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $312.21. The company has a market cap of $631.50 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 34.27, a PEG ratio of 2.33 and a beta of 0.95. Visa Inc. has a 52-week low of $252.70 and a 52-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 released its earnings results on Thursday, January 30th. The credit-card processor reported $2.75 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.66 by $0.09. Visa had a return on equity of 54.79% and a net margin of 54.27%. Analysts predict that Visa Inc. will post 11.3 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Visa Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, March 3rd. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, February 11th were paid a $0.59 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, February 11th. This represents a $2.36 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.69%. Visa’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 23.79%.

Insider Activity

In related news, insider Paul D. Fabara sold 39,350 shares of Visa stock in a transaction on 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 directly owns 26,413 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $8,642,333.60. The trade was a 59.84 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. Also, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,620 shares of Visa 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. In the last ninety days, insiders sold 103,855 shares of company stock valued at $35,165,827. Company insiders own 0.13% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of analysts have issued reports on V shares. Raymond James reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and issued a $393.00 target price (up previously from $374.00) on shares of Visa in a report on Friday, January 31st. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised their price objective on Visa from $340.00 to $375.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Friday, January 31st. Oppenheimer reiterated an “outperform” rating on shares of Visa in a research report on Thursday, February 13th. Piper Sandler reiterated an “overweight” rating and issued a $383.00 price objective (up previously from $368.00) on shares of Visa in a research report on Friday, January 31st. Finally, Citigroup reiterated a “neutral” rating on shares of Visa in a research report on Thursday, February 13th. Six research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-three have issued a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $353.96.

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.