Longbow Finance SA Acquires 18,508 Shares of Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Longbow Finance SA lifted its stake in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 49.7% during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund owned 55,714 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after purchasing an additional 18,508 shares during the period. Visa comprises about 1.9% of Longbow Finance SA’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 11th largest position. Longbow Finance SA’s holdings in Visa were worth $17,608,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Several other institutional investors also recently added to or reduced their stakes in V. Swedbank AB increased its stake in shares of Visa by 10.7% during the third quarter. Swedbank AB now owns 2,059,111 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $566,153,000 after buying an additional 199,440 shares during the period. Howard Capital Management Group LLC increased its position in Visa by 0.6% during the 3rd quarter. Howard Capital Management Group LLC now owns 106,355 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $29,242,000 after purchasing an additional 610 shares during the period. Pettinga Financial Advisors LLC bought a new stake in shares of Visa in the 3rd quarter valued at about $228,000. Farmers & Merchants Investments Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Visa by 3.2% in the 3rd quarter. Farmers & Merchants Investments Inc. now owns 72,449 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $19,920,000 after purchasing an additional 2,250 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Hedeker Wealth LLC boosted its stake in shares of Visa by 0.8% during the third quarter. Hedeker Wealth LLC now owns 24,224 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $6,660,000 after purchasing an additional 202 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 82.15% of the company’s stock.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, insider Tullier Kelly Mahon sold 33,741 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, February 7th. The stock was sold at an average price of $349.77, for a total transaction of $11,801,589.57. Following the sale, the insider now directly owns 36,566 shares in the company, valued at $12,789,689.82. This trade represents a 47.99 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Also, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,620 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, January 2nd. The stock was 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 90 days, insiders have sold 55,885 shares of company stock worth $19,161,447. Corporate insiders own 0.13% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of research firms have weighed in on V. Citigroup restated a “neutral” rating on shares of Visa in a report on Thursday, February 13th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted their price target on Visa from $340.00 to $375.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Friday, January 31st. Oppenheimer reaffirmed an “outperform” rating on shares of Visa in a research report on Thursday, February 13th. Bank of America boosted their target price on shares of Visa from $331.00 to $363.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, January 31st. Finally, Raymond James restated an “outperform” rating and issued a $393.00 price target (up from $374.00) on shares of Visa in a report on Friday, January 31st. Six research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-three have issued a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $353.96.

Visa Trading Up 1.4 %

NYSE V opened at $355.56 on Friday. Visa Inc. has a 1 year low of $252.70 and a 1 year high of $360.31. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.45, a current ratio of 1.12 and a quick ratio of 1.12. The company has a market capitalization of $660.55 billion, a PE ratio of 35.84, a P/E/G ratio of 2.33 and a beta of 0.97. The company has a fifty day moving average of $332.12 and a 200 day moving average of $304.62.

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

Visa Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, March 3rd. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, February 11th will be issued a $0.59 dividend. This represents a $2.36 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.66%. The ex-dividend date is Tuesday, February 11th. Visa’s payout ratio is presently 23.79%.

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.