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

Blue Trust Inc. increased its holdings in shares of Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 132.9% in the second quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 13,455 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after purchasing an additional 7,679 shares during the period. Blue Trust Inc.’s holdings in Visa were worth $3,755,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Other institutional investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. BOK Financial Private Wealth Inc. boosted its holdings in Visa by 65.6% during the fourth quarter. BOK Financial Private Wealth Inc. now owns 1,267 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $330,000 after buying an additional 502 shares in the last quarter. Lam Group Inc. acquired a new position in Visa in the 4th quarter worth approximately $78,000. Cullen Investment Group LTD. acquired a new position in Visa in the 4th quarter worth approximately $9,754,000. Drake & Associates LLC boosted its stake in Visa by 2.2% in the 4th quarter. Drake & Associates LLC now owns 2,265 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $590,000 after purchasing an additional 49 shares during the period. Finally, Dakota Wealth Management boosted its stake in Visa by 1.0% in the 4th quarter. Dakota Wealth Management now owns 126,621 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $32,966,000 after purchasing an additional 1,233 shares during the period. 82.15% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of equities analysts recently commented on the stock. Macquarie reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and issued a $300.00 price objective on shares of Visa in a research note on Wednesday, July 24th. Royal Bank of Canada cut their target price on shares of Visa from $315.00 to $311.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday, July 24th. StockNews.com upgraded shares of Visa from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, August 9th. William Blair upgraded shares of Visa to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, July 23rd. Finally, Jefferies Financial Group cut their target price on shares of Visa from $325.00 to $300.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday, July 24th. Six equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-one have given a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Visa currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $307.25.

Visa Price Performance

Shares of Visa stock traded up $0.58 during trading on Friday, hitting $267.38. 5,111,080 shares of the company’s stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 7,227,860. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.54, a current ratio of 1.37 and a quick ratio of 1.37. The firm’s fifty day moving average price is $266.41 and its 200 day moving average price is $273.59. Visa Inc. has a twelve month low of $227.78 and a twelve month high of $290.96. The company has a market cap of $489.02 billion, a PE ratio of 29.87, a PEG ratio of 1.84 and a beta of 0.95.

Visa (NYSE:V) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, July 23rd. The credit-card processor reported $2.42 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, meeting the consensus estimate of $2.42. Visa had a net margin of 54.72% and a return on equity of 51.94%. The firm had revenue of $8.90 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $8.92 billion. During the same period last year, the firm posted $2.16 EPS. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 9.6% on a year-over-year basis. Analysts forecast that Visa Inc. will post 9.91 earnings per share for the current year.

Visa Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, September 3rd. Investors of record on Friday, August 9th will be issued a dividend of $0.52 per share. This represents a $2.08 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.78%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, August 9th. Visa’s dividend payout ratio is currently 23.24%.

Visa Company 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.