Visa (NYSE:V) Stock Price Up 1.1% – Time to Buy?

Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) shot up 1.1% on Wednesday . The company traded as high as $321.54 and last traded at $320.65. 2,684,103 shares changed hands during mid-day trading, a decline of 61% from the average session volume of 6,969,813 shares. The stock had previously closed at $317.22.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several analysts recently commented on the stock. Bank of America increased their target price on shares of Visa from $279.00 to $308.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Tuesday, September 17th. TD Cowen lifted their target price on shares of Visa from $318.00 to $325.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. Piper Sandler increased their price objective on Visa from $319.00 to $322.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Jefferies Financial Group boosted their target price on Visa from $320.00 to $330.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Finally, Citigroup upped their price target on shares of Visa from $319.00 to $326.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Four analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-five have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Visa presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $328.41.

Visa Stock Up 1.1 %

The firm’s 50-day simple moving average is $304.77 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $283.24. The stock has a market cap of $597.33 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 32.95, 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 posted its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 29th. The credit-card processor reported $2.71 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate 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 net margin of 54.96% and a return on equity of 53.16%. Visa’s revenue was up 11.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $2.33 EPS. On average, sell-side analysts expect that Visa Inc. will post 11.23 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Visa Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, December 2nd. Investors of record on Tuesday, November 12th were given a $0.59 dividend. This represents a $2.36 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.74%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, November 12th. This is a positive change from Visa’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.52. Visa’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 24.25%.

Insider Activity at Visa

In other news, insider Paul D. Fabara sold 2,171 shares of Visa stock in a transaction that occurred 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 in the company, valued at approximately $5,510,815.18. The trade was a 10.82 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this link. 0.13% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Visa

Institutional investors and hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. International Assets Investment Management LLC boosted its holdings in Visa by 45,189.4% in the third quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC now owns 9,758,505 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $2,683,101,000 after acquiring an additional 9,736,958 shares during the last quarter. SG Americas Securities LLC increased its holdings in Visa by 4,412.3% during the 3rd quarter. SG Americas Securities LLC now owns 4,072,467 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $1,119,725,000 after purchasing an additional 4,166,905 shares in the last quarter. State Street Corp boosted its holdings in Visa by 4.5% during the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 76,610,942 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $21,064,179,000 after acquiring an additional 3,327,977 shares during the last quarter. FMR LLC boosted its stake in shares of Visa by 6.1% in the 3rd quarter. FMR LLC now owns 57,111,843 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $15,702,901,000 after buying an additional 3,265,518 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its holdings in Visa by 7.7% during the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 38,655,250 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $10,601,135,000 after acquiring an additional 2,772,549 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 82.15% 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.