Siemens Fonds Invest GmbH Cuts Stake in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Siemens Fonds Invest GmbH trimmed its holdings in shares of Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 76.2% during the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 12,265 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after selling 39,325 shares during the period. Siemens Fonds Invest GmbH’s holdings in Visa were worth $3,876,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Other institutional investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its position in Visa by 4.6% during the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 159,405,343 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $50,378,465,000 after acquiring an additional 7,079,706 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its stake in shares of Visa by 4.4% during the 4th quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 40,345,176 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $12,729,901,000 after purchasing an additional 1,689,926 shares during the last quarter. Capital International Investors boosted its position in Visa by 3.8% during the fourth quarter. Capital International Investors now owns 23,816,573 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $7,526,660,000 after purchasing an additional 866,596 shares in the last quarter. Capital World Investors grew its stake in Visa by 1.0% in the fourth quarter. Capital World Investors now owns 23,277,622 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $7,356,614,000 after purchasing an additional 241,057 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Northern Trust Corp raised its holdings in Visa by 18.0% in the fourth quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 18,260,714 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $5,771,116,000 after purchasing an additional 2,785,707 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 82.15% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of analysts have recently weighed in on the stock. Oppenheimer restated an “outperform” rating on shares of Visa in a report on Thursday, February 13th. StockNews.com raised shares of Visa from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday. UBS Group cut their price target on shares of Visa from $400.00 to $395.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Wednesday, April 30th. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods reaffirmed a “hold” rating on shares of Visa in a research report on Thursday, February 13th. Finally, Raymond James reissued an “outperform” rating and issued a $393.00 price objective (up previously from $374.00) on shares of Visa in a research report on Friday, January 31st. Six research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-one have issued a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $362.38.

Visa Stock Performance

NYSE:V opened at $361.87 on Friday. The company has a market cap of $672.27 billion, a P/E ratio of 36.48, a P/E/G ratio of 2.33 and a beta of 0.96. Visa Inc. has a twelve month low of $252.70 and a twelve month high of $366.54. The company’s 50-day moving average price is $337.92 and its 200-day moving average price is $328.77. The company has a current ratio of 1.12, a quick ratio of 1.12 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.45.

Visa (NYSE:V) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, April 29th. The credit-card processor reported $2.76 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.68 by $0.08. The company had revenue of $9.59 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $9.57 billion. Visa had a net margin of 54.27% and a return on equity of 54.79%. Visa’s quarterly revenue was up 9.3% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm earned $2.51 EPS. On average, sell-side analysts forecast that Visa Inc. will post 11.3 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Visa Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, June 2nd. Investors of record on Tuesday, May 13th will be given a dividend of $0.59 per share. This represents a $2.36 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.65%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Tuesday, May 13th. Visa’s payout ratio is currently 23.72%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Visa news, insider Paul D. Fabara sold 39,350 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, March 14th. The shares were sold at an average price of $327.20, for a total value of $12,875,320.00. Following the transaction, the insider now owns 26,413 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $8,642,333.60. This represents a 59.84% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,620 shares of Visa stock in a transaction dated Monday, March 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $363.00, for a total transaction of $3,129,060.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 537 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $194,931. This represents a 94.14% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 121,948 shares of company stock valued at $41,548,282 over the last ninety days. Company insiders own 0.13% of the company’s stock.

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.