Smith Anglin Financial LLC Has $1.77 Million Position in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Smith Anglin Financial LLC cut its holdings in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 5.4% in the fourth quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 5,593 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after selling 319 shares during the quarter. Smith Anglin Financial LLC’s holdings in Visa were worth $1,768,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other institutional investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Peterson Financial Group Inc. bought a new position in shares of Visa in the 3rd quarter valued at approximately $26,000. Modus Advisors LLC acquired a new position in Visa during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $32,000. Reston Wealth Management LLC bought a new position in shares of Visa in the third quarter valued at approximately $31,000. West Financial Advisors LLC lifted its stake in shares of Visa by 101.4% in the third quarter. West Financial Advisors LLC now owns 145 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $40,000 after buying an additional 73 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Global Wealth Strategies & Associates boosted its holdings in shares of Visa by 79.0% during the 3rd quarter. Global Wealth Strategies & Associates now owns 179 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $49,000 after buying an additional 79 shares during the period. 82.15% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several research analysts recently commented on V shares. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft lifted their target price on shares of Visa from $300.00 to $340.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Monness Crespi & Hardt reissued a “neutral” rating on shares of Visa in a research report on Tuesday, September 24th. Jefferies Financial Group raised their target price on Visa from $320.00 to $330.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Robert W. Baird upped their price target on Visa from $330.00 to $340.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Finally, Oppenheimer increased their price objective on Visa from $321.00 to $375.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Thursday, December 19th. Four analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-four have assigned a buy rating and two have issued a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $331.92.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Visa news, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,620 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, January 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $317.78, for a total transaction of $2,739,263.60. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, insider Paul D. Fabara sold 2,171 shares of Visa stock in a transaction on Friday, November 22nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $307.97, for a total value of $668,602.87. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now directly owns 17,894 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $5,510,815.18. This trade represents a 10.82 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders own 0.13% of the company’s stock.

Visa Stock Performance

NYSE V opened at $316.45 on Thursday. Visa Inc. has a 1-year low of $252.70 and a 1-year high of $321.61. The company has a 50 day moving average of $312.76 and a 200-day moving average of $287.65. The company has a current ratio of 1.28, a quick ratio of 1.28 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.55. The firm has a market cap of $589.51 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 32.52, a PEG ratio of 2.06 and a beta of 0.96.

Visa (NYSE:V) last released its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, October 29th. The credit-card processor reported $2.71 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.58 by $0.13. The firm had revenue of $9.62 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $9.49 billion. Visa had a return on equity of 53.16% and a net margin of 54.96%. The business’s revenue was up 11.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the firm posted $2.33 EPS. On average, equities analysts forecast that Visa Inc. will post 11.22 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Visa Increases Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, December 2nd. Investors of record on Tuesday, November 12th were given a dividend of $0.59 per share. 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 0.75%. Visa’s dividend payout ratio is 24.25%.

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.