L & S Advisors Inc Has $5.22 Million Position in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

L & S Advisors Inc boosted its position in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 1,695.0% during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The fund owned 16,514 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after buying an additional 15,594 shares during the quarter. L & S Advisors Inc’s holdings in Visa were worth $5,219,000 as of its most recent filing with the SEC.

A number of other large investors have also recently bought and sold shares of V. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its holdings in Visa by 4.6% during the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 159,405,343 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $50,378,465,000 after acquiring an additional 7,079,706 shares in the last quarter. State Street Corp raised its stake in shares of Visa by 4.5% during the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 76,610,942 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $21,064,179,000 after purchasing an additional 3,327,977 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Visa by 7.7% in the 3rd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 38,655,250 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $10,601,135,000 after buying an additional 2,772,549 shares during the last quarter. Norges Bank bought a new position in shares of Visa in the fourth quarter valued at $5,171,271,000. Finally, Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. increased its holdings in Visa by 6.2% during the fourth quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 12,241,003 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $3,868,646,000 after buying an additional 718,558 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 82.15% of the company’s stock.

Visa Trading Down 2.1 %

V opened at $342.62 on Friday. The stock has a market capitalization of $636.51 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 34.54, a P/E/G ratio of 2.33 and a beta of 0.95. The company has a quick ratio of 1.12, a current ratio of 1.12 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.45. Visa Inc. has a twelve month low of $252.70 and a twelve month high of $366.54. The company has a 50-day simple moving average of $343.60 and a 200 day simple moving average of $315.27.

Visa (NYSE:V) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, January 30th. The credit-card processor reported $2.75 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.66 by $0.09. Visa had a net margin of 54.27% and a return on equity of 54.79%. Analysts predict that Visa Inc. will post 11.3 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Visa Announces Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, March 3rd. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, February 11th were issued a $0.59 dividend. This represents a $2.36 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.69%. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, February 11th. Visa’s dividend payout ratio is presently 23.79%.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of research analysts have recently commented on the stock. William Blair reissued an “outperform” rating on shares of Visa in a research report on Friday, January 31st. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods reiterated a “hold” rating on shares of Visa in a report on Thursday, February 13th. Barclays upped their price objective on Visa from $361.00 to $396.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, February 3rd. Piper Sandler reiterated an “overweight” rating and set a $383.00 target price (up from $368.00) on shares of Visa in a research note on Friday, January 31st. Finally, Raymond James restated an “outperform” rating and issued a $393.00 price target (up previously from $374.00) on shares of Visa in a research note on Friday, January 31st. Five investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-three have assigned a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Visa has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $355.84.

Insider Activity

In other news, General Counsel Julie B. Rottenberg sold 2,572 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Monday, February 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $340.00, for a total transaction of $874,480.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the general counsel now directly owns 11,925 shares in the company, valued at approximately $4,054,500. This represents a 17.74 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. 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. In the last quarter, insiders have sold 143,205 shares of company stock worth $48,560,961. Insiders own 0.13% of the company’s stock.

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.