WealthTrust Axiom LLC Makes New Investment in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

WealthTrust Axiom LLC acquired a new position in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm acquired 1,135 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock, valued at approximately $296,000.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also bought and sold shares of the business. Certuity LLC lifted its holdings in Visa by 17.0% in the 4th quarter. Certuity LLC now owns 11,080 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $2,885,000 after buying an additional 1,613 shares during the period. Penobscot Investment Management Company Inc. lifted its holdings in Visa by 5.4% in the 4th quarter. Penobscot Investment Management Company Inc. now owns 69,732 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $18,155,000 after buying an additional 3,572 shares during the period. Cozad Asset Management Inc. lifted its holdings in Visa by 1.9% in the 4th quarter. Cozad Asset Management Inc. now owns 4,419 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $1,150,000 after buying an additional 84 shares during the period. Duff & Phelps Investment Management Co. lifted its holdings in Visa by 0.3% in the 4th quarter. Duff & Phelps Investment Management Co. now owns 17,812 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $4,637,000 after buying an additional 50 shares during the period. Finally, Field & Main Bank raised its position in shares of Visa by 1.2% in the 4th quarter. Field & Main Bank now owns 17,189 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $4,475,000 after acquiring an additional 200 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 82.15% of the company’s stock.

Insider Buying and Selling at Visa

In other Visa news, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,150 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, February 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $273.39, for a total transaction of $2,228,128.50. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. In other Visa news, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,150 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, February 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $273.39, for a total transaction of $2,228,128.50. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. Also, CAO Peter M. Andreski sold 2,615 shares of Visa stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, February 7th. The stock was sold at an average price of $278.88, for a total value of $729,271.20. Following the completion of the sale, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 4,898 shares in the company, valued at $1,365,954.24. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 19,874 shares of company stock valued at $5,506,827 over the last ninety days. 0.19% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Visa Price Performance

NYSE V opened at $268.64 on Wednesday. The company has a market capitalization of $493.36 billion, a PE ratio of 30.02, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.87 and a beta of 0.96. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.53, a quick ratio of 1.40 and a current ratio of 1.40. The business’s fifty day moving average is $278.98 and its 200 day moving average is $265.19. Visa Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $216.14 and a fifty-two week high of $290.96.

Visa (NYSE:V) last released its earnings results on Tuesday, April 23rd. The credit-card processor reported $2.51 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.43 by $0.08. The company had revenue of $8.78 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $8.62 billion. Visa had a return on equity of 51.23% and a net margin of 53.87%. Visa’s quarterly revenue was up 9.9% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the business earned $2.09 earnings per share. Sell-side analysts predict that Visa Inc. will post 9.9 earnings per share for the current year.

Visa Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, June 3rd. Shareholders of record on Friday, May 17th will be issued a dividend of $0.52 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, May 16th. This represents a $2.08 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.77%. Visa’s dividend payout ratio is presently 23.24%.

Analyst Ratings Changes

V has been the subject of several research reports. Wells Fargo & Company increased their target price on Visa from $300.00 to $325.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, March 6th. Oppenheimer increased their target price on Visa from $297.00 to $299.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, April 24th. Barclays increased their target price on Visa from $304.00 to $319.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Monday, January 29th. Susquehanna increased their target price on Visa from $300.00 to $326.00 and gave the stock a “positive” rating in a research report on Friday, January 26th. Finally, Raymond James increased their target price on Visa from $287.00 to $311.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Friday, January 26th. Five analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and twenty have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $302.58.

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.