Romano Brothers AND Company Increases Holdings in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Romano Brothers AND Company lifted its position in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 1.4% in the fourth quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The firm owned 8,606 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after purchasing an additional 116 shares during the period. Romano Brothers AND Company’s holdings in Visa were worth $2,720,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other large investors have also recently modified their holdings of V. Custom Index Systems LLC purchased a new stake in Visa during the third quarter worth $731,000. Copley Financial Group Inc. purchased a new stake in Visa during the third quarter worth $616,000. FORA Capital LLC purchased a new stake in Visa during the third quarter worth $7,987,000. Chicago Capital LLC lifted its holdings in Visa by 5.2% during the third quarter. Chicago Capital LLC now owns 404,914 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $111,331,000 after buying an additional 20,023 shares during the period. Finally, Nexus Investment Management ULC lifted its holdings in Visa by 5,034.0% during the third quarter. Nexus Investment Management ULC now owns 56,371 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $15,499,000 after buying an additional 55,273 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 82.15% of the company’s stock.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,620 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, January 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $317.78, for a total value of $2,739,263.60. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, insider Paul D. Fabara sold 2,171 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Friday, November 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $307.97, for a total transaction 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 approximately $5,510,815.18. The trade was a 10.82 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 0.13% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of analysts have weighed in on V shares. Robert W. Baird upped 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. Seaport Res Ptn raised Visa from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, January 14th. Citigroup upped their price target on Visa from $326.00 to $354.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, January 14th. BMO Capital Markets upped their price target on Visa from $310.00 to $320.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Finally, TD Cowen upped their price target on Visa from $318.00 to $325.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-four have assigned a buy rating and two have given a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $331.92.

Visa Stock Performance

V opened at $319.97 on Tuesday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.55, a current ratio of 1.28 and a quick ratio of 1.28. The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $313.41 and a 200 day moving average price of $288.73. Visa Inc. has a 1 year low of $252.70 and a 1 year high of $321.61. The stock has a market cap of $596.06 billion, a P/E ratio of 32.88, a P/E/G ratio of 2.06 and a beta of 0.96.

Visa (NYSE:V) last posted its 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 firm had revenue of $9.62 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $9.49 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $2.33 EPS. The business’s revenue was up 11.7% compared to the same quarter last year. Equities research analysts anticipate that Visa Inc. will post 11.22 earnings per share for the current 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 paid a $0.59 dividend. This is a boost from Visa’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.52. This represents a $2.36 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.74%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, November 12th. Visa’s payout ratio is currently 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.