Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) Raises Dividend to $0.59 Per Share

Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) declared a quarterly dividend on Tuesday, October 29th,Zacks Dividends reports. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, November 12th will be paid a dividend of 0.59 per share by the credit-card processor on Monday, December 2nd. This represents a $2.36 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.77%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Tuesday, November 12th. This is a positive change from Visa’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.52.

Visa has increased its dividend payment by an average of 15.3% annually over the last three years and has raised its dividend every year for the last 17 years. Visa has a payout ratio of 21.1% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Equities research analysts expect Visa to earn $12.65 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $2.36 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 18.7%.

Visa Price Performance

Visa stock opened at $307.87 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.55, a quick ratio of 1.37 and a current ratio of 1.28. The company’s fifty day moving average price is $283.95 and its 200 day moving average price is $274.67. The stock has a market capitalization of $561.03 billion, a P/E ratio of 31.64, a P/E/G ratio of 2.06 and a beta of 0.95. Visa has a 1 year low of $240.97 and a 1 year high of $311.15.

Visa (NYSE:V) last released its earnings results on Tuesday, October 29th. The credit-card processor reported $2.71 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.58 by $0.13. The business had revenue of $9.62 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $9.49 billion. Visa had a net margin of 54.96% and a return on equity of 53.16%. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 11.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company earned $2.33 earnings per share. As a group, equities research analysts anticipate that Visa will post 11.18 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several research firms have recently weighed in on V. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods upgraded Visa from a “moderate buy” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, September 24th. William Blair raised shares of Visa to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, July 23rd. The Goldman Sachs Group reaffirmed a “buy” rating and set a $317.00 target price on shares of Visa in a report on Thursday, September 12th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised their price target on shares of Visa from $290.00 to $320.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Tuesday, August 20th. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada upped their price objective on shares of Visa from $311.00 to $322.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-four have assigned a buy rating and two have given a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $321.74.

Insider Buying and Selling at Visa

In related news, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,620 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, September 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $276.37, for a total transaction of $2,382,309.40. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 538 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $148,687.06. This represents a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. 0.19% 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.