Fortis Group Advisors LLC Boosts Stake in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Fortis Group Advisors LLC lifted its position in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 2.4% in the 4th quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 14,163 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after acquiring an additional 334 shares during the period. Fortis Group Advisors LLC’s holdings in Visa were worth $4,476,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in V. Decker Retirement Planning Inc. purchased a new position in shares of Visa during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $26,000. Peterson Financial Group Inc. bought a new position in Visa during the 3rd quarter valued at approximately $26,000. POM Investment Strategies LLC raised its stake in Visa by 48.5% during the fourth quarter. POM Investment Strategies LLC now owns 98 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $31,000 after buying an additional 32 shares during the last quarter. Modus Advisors LLC bought a new stake in Visa in the fourth quarter worth $32,000. Finally, Reston Wealth Management LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Visa in the third quarter worth $31,000. 82.15% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of brokerages recently issued reports on V. Jefferies Financial Group upped their price target on shares of Visa from $320.00 to $330.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upped their target price on shares of Visa from $340.00 to $375.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Friday, January 31st. Susquehanna raised their price target on shares of Visa from $375.00 to $395.00 and gave the company a “positive” rating in a research report on Friday, January 31st. Seaport Res Ptn raised Visa from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, January 14th. Finally, Robert W. Baird lifted their target price on Visa from $330.00 to $340.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-five have assigned a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $354.73.

Visa Price Performance

NYSE V opened at $350.45 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.45, a quick ratio of 1.12 and a current ratio of 1.12. The business’s fifty day moving average is $328.47 and its 200 day moving average is $301.39. The company has a market capitalization of $651.05 billion, a PE ratio of 35.33, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.37 and a beta of 0.97. Visa Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $252.70 and a fifty-two week high of $357.15.

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

Visa Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, March 3rd. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, February 11th will be given a dividend of $0.59 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Tuesday, February 11th. This represents a $2.36 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.67%. Visa’s payout ratio is 23.79%.

Insider Activity

In related 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 sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. Also, CAO Peter M. Andreski sold 2,332 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Friday, February 7th. The shares were sold at an average price of $349.62, for a total transaction of $815,313.84. Following the transaction, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 4,488 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,569,094.56. The trade was a 34.19 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 55,885 shares of company stock worth $19,161,447 in the last three months. Company insiders own 0.13% of the company’s stock.

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.