Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) Stake Decreased by Cottage Street Advisors LLC

Cottage Street Advisors LLC cut its stake in shares of Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 2.6% in the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The institutional investor owned 18,697 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after selling 505 shares during the quarter. Visa makes up 3.1% of Cottage Street Advisors LLC’s holdings, making the stock its 9th biggest holding. Cottage Street Advisors LLC’s holdings in Visa were worth $5,909,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also made changes to their positions in the company. Hirtle Callaghan & Co LLC increased its holdings in shares of Visa by 1.3% during the 4th quarter. Hirtle Callaghan & Co LLC now owns 2,291 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $724,000 after acquiring an additional 29 shares during the last quarter. Elevation Wealth Partners LLC lifted its position in shares of Visa by 3.3% during the fourth quarter. Elevation Wealth Partners LLC now owns 939 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $297,000 after purchasing an additional 30 shares during the last quarter. Warther Private Wealth LLC lifted its stake in Visa by 1.0% in the 4th quarter. Warther Private Wealth LLC now owns 2,935 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $928,000 after purchasing an additional 30 shares in the last quarter. Valmark Advisers Inc. increased its holdings in shares of Visa by 0.4% in the 4th quarter. Valmark Advisers Inc. now owns 7,251 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $2,292,000 after purchasing an additional 30 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Strategic Family Wealth Counselors L.L.C. grew its position in shares of Visa by 0.4% during the 4th quarter. Strategic Family Wealth Counselors L.L.C. now owns 7,283 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $2,302,000 after buying an additional 30 shares during the last quarter. 82.15% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities research analysts have recently commented on the company. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods reiterated a “hold” rating on shares of Visa in a research report on Thursday, February 13th. Oppenheimer reiterated an “outperform” rating on shares of Visa in a report on Thursday, February 13th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upped their price objective on Visa from $340.00 to $375.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Friday, January 31st. The Goldman Sachs Group upped their price objective on shares of Visa from $346.00 to $384.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, January 31st. Finally, Seaport Res Ptn upgraded shares of Visa from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, January 14th. Six investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-three have assigned a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $353.96.

Visa Trading Up 0.3 %

Shares of Visa stock opened at $344.95 on Wednesday. The company has a quick ratio of 1.12, a current ratio of 1.12 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.45. The company’s 50-day simple moving average is $341.94 and its 200-day simple moving average is $314.21. The firm has a market cap of $640.84 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 34.77, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.33 and a beta of 0.95. Visa Inc. has a 52-week low of $252.70 and a 52-week high of $366.54.

Visa (NYSE:V) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, January 30th. The credit-card processor reported $2.75 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.66 by $0.09. Visa had a net margin of 54.27% and a return on equity of 54.79%. As a group, equities research analysts anticipate that Visa Inc. will post 11.3 earnings per share for the current year.

Visa Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, March 3rd. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, February 11th were given a $0.59 dividend. This represents a $2.36 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.68%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, February 11th. Visa’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 23.79%.

Insider Activity at Visa

In other news, insider Paul D. Fabara sold 39,350 shares of Visa stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, March 19th. The shares were sold at an average price of $340.41, for a total value of $13,395,133.50. Following the transaction, the insider now owns 26,413 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $8,991,249.33. The trade was a 59.84 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through this link. Also, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,620 shares of the 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 disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 143,205 shares of company stock worth $48,560,961 in the last three months. 0.13% of the stock is owned by company 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.