Blackston Financial Advisory Group LLC Buys 164 Shares of Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Blackston Financial Advisory Group LLC raised its stake in shares of Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 7.9% in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 2,238 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after purchasing an additional 164 shares during the period. Blackston Financial Advisory Group LLC’s holdings in Visa were worth $708,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other large investors have also bought and sold shares of V. Swedbank AB lifted its stake in shares of Visa by 10.7% in the 3rd quarter. Swedbank AB now owns 2,059,111 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $566,153,000 after purchasing an additional 199,440 shares during the period. Howard Capital Management Group LLC lifted its stake in shares of Visa by 0.6% in the 3rd quarter. Howard Capital Management Group LLC now owns 106,355 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $29,242,000 after purchasing an additional 610 shares during the period. Heritage Oak Wealth Advisors LLC acquired a new position in shares of Visa in the 3rd quarter valued at about $368,000. Ballentine Partners LLC lifted its stake in shares of Visa by 11.6% in the 3rd quarter. Ballentine Partners LLC now owns 37,096 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $10,199,000 after purchasing an additional 3,864 shares during the period. Finally, Heritage Financial Services LLC acquired a new position in shares of Visa in the 3rd quarter valued at about $205,000. 82.15% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of research analysts have recently issued reports on the company. Bank of America boosted their price objective on Visa from $331.00 to $363.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Friday, January 31st. UBS Group boosted their target price on Visa from $350.00 to $400.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, January 31st. Oppenheimer reaffirmed an “outperform” rating on shares of Visa in a research report on Thursday, February 13th. Raymond James reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and issued a $393.00 target price (up from $374.00) on shares of Visa in a research report on Friday, January 31st. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company boosted their target price on Visa from $360.00 to $395.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Friday, January 31st. Six investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-three have issued a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $353.96.

Insider Transactions at Visa

In other news, General Counsel Julie B. Rottenberg sold 2,572 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Monday, February 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $340.00, for a total value of $874,480.00. Following the transaction, the general counsel now owns 11,925 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $4,054,500. This represents a 17.74 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, CAO Peter M. Andreski sold 2,332 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Friday, February 7th. The stock was sold at an average price of $349.62, for a total transaction of $815,313.84. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 4,488 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,569,094.56. The trade was a 34.19 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last quarter, insiders have sold 55,885 shares of company stock valued at $19,161,447. 0.13% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Visa Trading Down 0.6 %

NYSE:V opened at $348.27 on Monday. The company has a market cap of $647.01 billion, a P/E ratio of 35.11, a P/E/G ratio of 2.33 and a beta of 0.97. The stock’s fifty day moving average price is $329.14 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $302.66. Visa Inc. has a 1 year low of $252.70 and a 1 year high of $357.15. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.45, a current ratio of 1.12 and a quick ratio of 1.12.

Visa (NYSE:V) last posted 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 return on equity of 54.79% and a net margin of 54.27%. As a group, analysts expect that Visa Inc. will post 11.3 EPS for the current year.

Visa Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, March 3rd. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, February 11th will be issued a $0.59 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Tuesday, February 11th. This represents a $2.36 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.68%. Visa’s payout ratio is currently 23.79%.

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.