Code Waechter LLC Cuts Stock Position in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Code Waechter LLC decreased its stake in shares of Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 20.5% in the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The institutional investor owned 679 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after selling 175 shares during the quarter. Code Waechter LLC’s holdings in Visa were worth $215,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other hedge funds have also added to or reduced their stakes in V. Christensen King & Associates Investment Services Inc. bought a new position in shares of Visa in the fourth quarter worth approximately $227,000. Grandview Asset Management LLC increased its position in shares of Visa by 11.9% during the fourth quarter. Grandview Asset Management LLC now owns 6,763 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $2,137,000 after acquiring an additional 717 shares in the last quarter. PSI Advisors LLC raised its holdings in Visa by 23.7% in the 4th quarter. PSI Advisors LLC now owns 522 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $165,000 after acquiring an additional 100 shares during the last quarter. Ellenbecker Investment Group lifted its position in Visa by 4.8% in the 4th quarter. Ellenbecker Investment Group now owns 1,834 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $580,000 after acquiring an additional 84 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Traveka Wealth LLC boosted its stake in Visa by 1.9% during the 4th quarter. Traveka Wealth LLC now owns 2,655 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $839,000 after purchasing an additional 49 shares during the last quarter. 82.15% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Visa Stock Performance

Shares of NYSE V opened at $309.24 on Wednesday. The stock has a market cap of $576.08 billion, a PE ratio of 31.78, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.11 and a beta of 0.96. Visa Inc. has a 1 year low of $252.70 and a 1 year high of $321.61. The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $312.76 and a 200-day moving average price of $287.65. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.55, a current ratio of 1.28 and a quick ratio of 1.28.

Visa (NYSE:V) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, October 29th. The credit-card processor reported $2.71 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.58 by $0.13. Visa had a return on equity of 53.16% and a net margin of 54.96%. The business had revenue of $9.62 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $9.49 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business posted $2.33 EPS. Visa’s revenue for the quarter was up 11.7% compared to the same quarter last year. Equities analysts anticipate that Visa Inc. will post 11.23 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Visa Increases Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, December 2nd. Investors of record on Tuesday, November 12th were paid a dividend of $0.59 per share. This represents a $2.36 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.76%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, November 12th. This is an increase from Visa’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.52. Visa’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 24.25%.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of research analysts have recently issued reports on the company. Barclays upped their price target on Visa from $319.00 to $347.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Monday, November 4th. BMO Capital Markets upped their target price on shares of Visa from $310.00 to $320.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. Macquarie raised their price target on shares of Visa from $300.00 to $335.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft boosted their price objective on shares of Visa from $300.00 to $340.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Finally, Monness Crespi & Hardt restated a “neutral” rating on shares of Visa in a report on Tuesday, September 24th. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-four have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $331.92.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Visa news, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,620 shares of Visa stock in a transaction on Thursday, January 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $317.78, for a total value of $2,739,263.60. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. Also, insider Paul D. Fabara sold 2,171 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Friday, November 22nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $307.97, for a total transaction of $668,602.87. Following the transaction, the insider now directly owns 17,894 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $5,510,815.18. This trade represents a 10.82 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 0.13% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

About Visa

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.