Mastercard Incorporated (NYSE:MA) Receives Consensus Rating of “Buy” from Analysts

Shares of Mastercard Incorporated (NYSE:MA) have been given a consensus rating of “Buy” by the twenty-eight research firms that are covering the stock, MarketBeat reports. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, one has assigned a hold rating, twenty have assigned a buy rating and six have given a strong buy rating to the company. The average 1-year target price among brokers that have issued a report on the stock in the last year is $656.0385.

A number of equities research analysts recently weighed in on the stock. Weiss Ratings downgraded shares of Mastercard from a “buy (b-)” rating to a “hold (c+)” rating in a research note on Friday, April 24th. Citigroup dropped their price target on shares of Mastercard from $735.00 to $675.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Tuesday, April 14th. BMO Capital Markets assumed coverage on shares of Mastercard in a research note on Tuesday, April 21st. They set an “outperform” rating and a $605.00 price target for the company. Dbs Bank raised shares of Mastercard to a “moderate buy” rating in a research note on Friday, March 27th. Finally, Royal Bank Of Canada lowered their target price on shares of Mastercard from $656.00 to $629.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, May 1st.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Mastercard

Several large investors have recently bought and sold shares of the company. Vanguard Group Inc. increased its stake in Mastercard by 0.6% in the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 79,897,854 shares of the credit services provider’s stock valued at $45,612,087,000 after purchasing an additional 466,514 shares in the last quarter. J. Stern & Co. LLP increased its stake in Mastercard by 53,535.0% in the fourth quarter. J. Stern & Co. LLP now owns 72,597,097 shares of the credit services provider’s stock valued at $41,444,231,000 after purchasing an additional 72,461,743 shares in the last quarter. State Street Corp increased its stake in Mastercard by 2.8% in the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 36,580,374 shares of the credit services provider’s stock valued at $20,807,283,000 after purchasing an additional 997,536 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC increased its stake in Mastercard by 1.7% in the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 20,686,605 shares of the credit services provider’s stock valued at $11,773,153,000 after purchasing an additional 349,369 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Capital International Investors increased its stake in Mastercard by 4.4% in the fourth quarter. Capital International Investors now owns 17,964,658 shares of the credit services provider’s stock valued at $10,256,368,000 after purchasing an additional 759,584 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 97.28% of the company’s stock.

Key Mastercard News

Here are the key news stories impacting Mastercard this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Mastercard is pushing deeper into AI-driven “agentic commerce” with its new Agent Pay and related partnerships, which could help it capture more of the next wave of digital payments as AI agents begin shopping and paying on behalf of consumers. Article Title
• Positive Sentiment: Mastercard expanded its cross-border payments footprint through partnerships involving PaidBy and the Appia Foundation, reinforcing its international network and transaction growth opportunities. Article Title
• Positive Sentiment: Zacks highlighted Mastercard’s network-focused model, faster growth profile, and estimated upside versus American Express, suggesting the stock may still have room to rerate as digital payments expand. Article Title
• Positive Sentiment: Mastercard announced a quarterly dividend, which can appeal to income-focused investors and signals continued cash generation and shareholder returns.
• Neutral Sentiment: Mastercard executives said consumers are still navigating the current economy reasonably well, which supports the view that spending trends remain stable but does not directly change the company’s outlook. Article Title
• Neutral Sentiment: Commentary on Mastercard’s former CMO and broader AI-driven marketing trends is more about the company’s thought leadership than a direct financial catalyst. Article Title
• Neutral Sentiment: Coverage comparing Mastercard with Remitly Global and a note about Mastercard being a top-ranked momentum stock are generally supportive, but they are more market commentary than new fundamentals. Article Title Article Title
• Negative Sentiment: News that Russia is working on a plan to remove Visa and Mastercard highlights geopolitical and regulatory risk that could weigh on long-term international payment volumes. Article Title

Mastercard Trading Down 0.5%

MA opened at $490.73 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 2.56, a current ratio of 0.98 and a quick ratio of 0.98. The company has a market cap of $433.60 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 28.40, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.54 and a beta of 0.74. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $499.08 and a 200 day simple moving average of $521.98. Mastercard has a fifty-two week low of $464.52 and a fifty-two week high of $601.77.

Mastercard (NYSE:MA) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, April 30th. The credit services provider reported $4.60 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $4.41 by $0.19. The business had revenue of $8.40 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $8.26 billion. Mastercard had a net margin of 45.88% and a return on equity of 212.96%. Mastercard’s revenue for the quarter was up 15.8% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $3.73 earnings per share. On average, sell-side analysts anticipate that Mastercard will post 19.6 earnings per share for the current year.

Mastercard Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, August 7th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, July 9th will be paid a $0.87 dividend. This represents a $3.48 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.7%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, July 9th. Mastercard’s dividend payout ratio is presently 20.14%.

About Mastercard

Mastercard Incorporated is a global payments technology company that operates a network connecting consumers, financial institutions, merchants, governments and businesses in more than 200 countries and territories. The company facilitates electronic payments and transaction processing for credit, debit and prepaid card products carrying the Mastercard brand, while also providing a range of payment-related services to issuers, acquirers and merchants. Its technology and network enable authorization, clearing and settlement of payments and support a broad set of use cases including point-of-sale, e-commerce and mobile payments.

Beyond core transaction processing, Mastercard offers a suite of value-added services such as fraud and risk management, identity and authentication tools, tokenization and digital wallet support, cross-border and commercial payment solutions, and data analytics and consulting services for merchants and financial partners.