Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) Shares Bought by Iowa State Bank

Iowa State Bank lifted its stake in shares of Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 0.7% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm owned 18,772 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after acquiring an additional 137 shares during the quarter. Iowa State Bank’s holdings in Visa were worth $5,933,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in V. Peterson Financial Group Inc. acquired a new position in Visa in the third quarter worth approximately $26,000. Reston Wealth Management LLC acquired a new position in shares of Visa in the third quarter worth about $31,000. Modus Advisors LLC purchased a new position in shares of Visa in the fourth quarter worth approximately $32,000. Fairway Wealth LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Visa during the second quarter valued at approximately $39,000. Finally, West Financial Advisors LLC boosted its stake in Visa by 101.4% in the 3rd quarter. West Financial Advisors LLC now owns 145 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $40,000 after purchasing an additional 73 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 82.15% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of brokerages have recently weighed in on V. Barclays lifted their price target on Visa from $319.00 to $347.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Monday, November 4th. Morgan Stanley raised their price objective on shares of Visa from $326.00 to $371.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, December 18th. Susquehanna raised their price objective on Visa from $339.00 to $375.00 and gave the company a “positive” rating in a research note on Wednesday, December 11th. Royal Bank of Canada lifted their price objective on Visa from $311.00 to $322.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. Finally, Oppenheimer raised their target price on Visa from $321.00 to $375.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Thursday, December 19th. Four research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-five have given a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $329.70.

Visa Trading Down 0.5 %

V traded down $1.47 during midday trading on Monday, reaching $313.44. 3,208,795 shares of the company were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 4,219,246. The stock’s 50-day simple moving average is $309.73 and its 200 day simple moving average is $285.76. Visa Inc. has a one year low of $252.70 and a one year high of $321.61. The stock has a market capitalization of $583.90 billion, a P/E ratio of 32.21, a PEG ratio of 2.11 and a beta of 0.96. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.55, a quick ratio of 1.28 and a current ratio of 1.28.

Visa (NYSE:V) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, October 29th. The credit-card processor reported $2.71 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.58 by $0.13. Visa had a net margin of 54.96% and a return on equity of 53.16%. The company had revenue of $9.62 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $9.49 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $2.33 EPS. The firm’s revenue was up 11.7% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, analysts forecast that Visa Inc. will post 11.23 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. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, November 12th were issued a $0.59 dividend. This represents a $2.36 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.75%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, November 12th. This is a boost from Visa’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.52. Visa’s dividend payout ratio is 24.25%.

Insider Activity

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

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.