Heartwood Wealth Advisors LLC Decreases Stake in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Heartwood Wealth Advisors LLC cut its position in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 1.2% during the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The firm owned 3,492 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after selling 42 shares during the quarter. Heartwood Wealth Advisors LLC’s holdings in Visa were worth $1,104,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also modified their holdings of V. LVM Capital Management Ltd. MI boosted its holdings in shares of Visa by 8.9% in the 4th quarter. LVM Capital Management Ltd. MI now owns 2,143 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $677,000 after buying an additional 176 shares in the last quarter. ORG Wealth Partners LLC lifted its position in Visa by 9.8% in the fourth quarter. ORG Wealth Partners LLC now owns 2,644 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $836,000 after acquiring an additional 236 shares during the last quarter. ST Germain D J Co. Inc. boosted its stake in Visa by 0.4% in the fourth quarter. ST Germain D J Co. Inc. now owns 28,734 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $9,081,000 after acquiring an additional 114 shares in the last quarter. ORG Partners LLC increased its position in shares of Visa by 28.6% during the fourth quarter. ORG Partners LLC now owns 5,307 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $1,680,000 after purchasing an additional 1,179 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Baker Tilly Wealth Management LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Visa by 5.2% in the 4th quarter. Baker Tilly Wealth Management LLC now owns 12,117 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $3,829,000 after purchasing an additional 601 shares during the last quarter. 82.15% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Visa Trading Down 1.6 %

Shares of NYSE V traded down $4.94 during midday trading on Friday, hitting $307.66. The stock had a trading volume of 3,659,804 shares, compared to its average volume of 4,985,953. The company has a quick ratio of 1.28, a current ratio of 1.28 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.55. The company has a market capitalization of $573.13 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 31.62, a PEG ratio of 2.11 and a beta of 0.96. The company has a fifty day moving average price of $311.80 and a 200 day moving average price of $286.63. Visa Inc. has a 1-year low of $252.70 and a 1-year high of $321.61.

Visa (NYSE:V) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 29th. The credit-card processor reported $2.71 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.58 by $0.13. Visa had a return on equity of 53.16% and a net margin of 54.96%. The company had revenue of $9.62 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $9.49 billion. During the same period last year, the company posted $2.33 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue was up 11.7% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, analysts predict that Visa Inc. will post 11.23 earnings per share for the current year.

Visa Increases Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, December 2nd. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, November 12th were given a $0.59 dividend. This is an increase from Visa’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.52. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, November 12th. This represents a $2.36 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.77%. Visa’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 24.25%.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several research analysts have commented on the company. BMO Capital Markets lifted their price target on Visa from $310.00 to $320.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods boosted their target price on Visa from $335.00 to $360.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Monday, December 9th. Oppenheimer raised their price target on Visa from $321.00 to $375.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, December 19th. Jefferies Financial Group upped their price objective on Visa from $320.00 to $330.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group restated a “buy” rating and set a $317.00 target price on shares of Visa in a research report on Thursday, September 12th. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-four have assigned a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $330.85.

Insider Transactions at Visa

In other news, insider Paul D. Fabara sold 2,171 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, November 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $307.97, for a total value of $668,602.87. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now owns 17,894 shares of the company’s stock, 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 document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. Also, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,620 shares of the firm’s 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. Corporate insiders own 0.13% of the company’s stock.

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.