Norges Bank Purchases Shares of 16,362,710 Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Norges Bank acquired a new position in shares of Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) in the 4th quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The fund acquired 16,362,710 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock, valued at approximately $5,171,271,000. Visa comprises approximately 0.7% of Norges Bank’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 20th largest position. Norges Bank owned about 0.88% of Visa at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Howard Capital Management Group LLC boosted its stake in shares of Visa by 0.6% during the third quarter. Howard Capital Management Group LLC now owns 106,355 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $29,242,000 after buying an additional 610 shares during the period. Principal Financial Group Inc. lifted its position in Visa by 7.7% during the 3rd quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 5,733,284 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $1,576,366,000 after acquiring an additional 411,210 shares during the period. Algert Global LLC purchased a new position in shares of Visa in the 3rd quarter valued at approximately $1,778,000. Truvestments Capital LLC acquired a new position in shares of Visa in the third quarter valued at approximately $133,000. Finally, Cadence Bank raised its stake in shares of Visa by 2.4% during the third quarter. Cadence Bank now owns 18,026 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $4,956,000 after purchasing an additional 425 shares during the last quarter. 82.15% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Insider Transactions at Visa

In other Visa news, General Counsel Julie B. Rottenberg sold 2,572 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, February 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $340.00, for a total value of $874,480.00. Following the sale, the general counsel now directly owns 11,925 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $4,054,500. This trade represents a 17.74 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. Also, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,620 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, January 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $317.78, for a total transaction of $2,739,263.60. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last quarter, insiders sold 143,205 shares of company stock worth $48,560,961. 0.13% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities analysts recently weighed in on the stock. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price objective on shares of Visa from $360.00 to $395.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Friday, January 31st. Susquehanna restated a “positive” rating on shares of Visa in a research report on Friday, March 21st. Seaport Res Ptn upgraded shares of Visa from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, January 14th. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods reaffirmed a “hold” rating on shares of Visa in a report on Thursday, February 13th. Finally, StockNews.com upgraded Visa from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, March 20th. Six research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-three have given a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Visa has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $353.96.

Visa Price Performance

Shares of NYSE V opened at $344.05 on Thursday. The business has a 50 day moving average price of $342.50 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $314.42. Visa Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $252.70 and a fifty-two week high of $366.54. The firm has a market cap of $639.17 billion, a PE ratio of 34.68, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.33 and a beta of 0.95. The company has a quick ratio of 1.12, a current ratio of 1.12 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.45.

Visa (NYSE:V) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, January 30th. The credit-card processor reported $2.75 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating 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 expect that Visa Inc. will post 11.3 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Visa Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, March 3rd. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, February 11th were issued a dividend of $0.59 per share. This represents a $2.36 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.69%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, February 11th. Visa’s dividend payout ratio is presently 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.