American Trust Increases Holdings in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

American Trust increased its holdings in shares of Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 10.5% in the 3rd quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The firm owned 22,149 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after acquiring an additional 2,111 shares during the period. American Trust’s holdings in Visa were worth $6,090,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in V. Peterson Financial Group Inc. bought a new position in Visa during the third quarter valued at approximately $26,000. POM Investment Strategies LLC boosted its position in shares of Visa by 970.0% during the 2nd quarter. POM Investment Strategies LLC now owns 107 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $28,000 after acquiring an additional 97 shares during the last quarter. Reston Wealth Management LLC purchased a new position in shares of Visa in the third quarter valued at $31,000. TruNorth Capital Management LLC grew its stake in shares of Visa by 211.9% in the 2nd quarter. TruNorth Capital Management LLC now owns 131 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $34,000 after buying an additional 89 shares in the last quarter. Finally, CarsonAllaria Wealth Management Ltd. bought a new stake in shares of Visa in the 2nd quarter worth about $35,000. Institutional investors own 82.15% of the company’s stock.

Insider Activity at Visa

In other Visa news, insider Paul D. Fabara sold 2,171 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Friday, November 22nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $307.97, for a total transaction of $668,602.87. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now directly owns 17,894 shares in the company, valued at approximately $5,510,815.18. This represents a 10.82 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. 0.19% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Visa Trading Up 0.1 %

Shares of NYSE:V opened at $314.23 on Friday. The business has a 50-day moving average price of $298.56 and a 200-day moving average price of $280.71. The stock has a market cap of $585.37 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 32.29, a PEG ratio of 2.11 and a beta of 0.96. Visa Inc. has a 52-week low of $252.70 and a 52-week high of $317.42. The company has a quick ratio of 1.28, a current ratio of 1.28 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.55.

Visa (NYSE:V) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 29th. The credit-card processor reported $2.71 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.58 by $0.13. The firm had revenue of $9.62 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $9.49 billion. Visa had a net margin of 54.96% and a return on equity of 53.16%. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 11.7% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business earned $2.33 earnings per share. Equities analysts predict that Visa Inc. will post 11.19 EPS for the current year.

Visa Increases Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, December 2nd. Investors of record on Tuesday, November 12th were issued a dividend of $0.59 per share. This represents a $2.36 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.75%. This is a positive change from Visa’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.52. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, November 12th. Visa’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 24.25%.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of analysts recently issued reports on the company. Susquehanna raised their price target on Visa from $339.00 to $375.00 and gave the stock a “positive” rating in a research report on Wednesday. Oppenheimer reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and set a $321.00 price target (up from $318.00) on shares of Visa in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. Mizuho increased their price objective on shares of Visa from $279.00 to $292.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, November 1st. Citigroup boosted their target price on Visa from $319.00 to $326.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Finally, Bank of America increased their price target on Visa from $279.00 to $308.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Tuesday, September 17th. Four research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-five have assigned a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, Visa currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $324.74.

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.