Visa Inc. $V Position Raised by Sands Capital Management LLC

Sands Capital Management LLC boosted its position in shares of Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 5.7% in the 2nd quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The institutional investor owned 4,030,104 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after buying an additional 217,062 shares during the quarter. Visa accounts for 4.1% of Sands Capital Management LLC’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 7th largest holding. Sands Capital Management LLC’s holdings in Visa were worth $1,430,889,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Norges Bank bought a new stake in Visa in the second quarter worth about $7,034,939,000. Nuveen LLC purchased a new stake in Visa in the first quarter worth $3,518,533,000. Vanguard Group Inc. increased its stake in Visa by 1.1% in the 1st quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 161,082,431 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $56,452,949,000 after buying an additional 1,677,088 shares during the period. Wellington Management Group LLP lifted its holdings in Visa by 17.7% during the 1st quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 10,979,720 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $3,847,953,000 after buying an additional 1,651,954 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC grew its stake in Visa by 2.5% in the 2nd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 43,096,802 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $15,253,245,000 after acquiring an additional 1,067,631 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 82.15% of the company’s stock.

Visa Trading Down 0.3%

Shares of NYSE:V opened at $329.53 on Wednesday. The company has a quick ratio of 1.08, a current ratio of 1.08 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.53. Visa Inc. has a 52-week low of $299.00 and a 52-week high of $375.51. The stock has a market cap of $600.31 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 32.28, a PEG ratio of 1.96 and a beta of 0.82. The business has a 50-day moving average price of $339.22 and a 200-day moving average price of $346.68.

Visa (NYSE:V) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, October 28th. The credit-card processor reported $2.98 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.97 by $0.01. The company had revenue of $10.72 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $10.60 billion. Visa had a net margin of 50.15% and a return on equity of 60.31%. Visa’s revenue for the quarter was up 11.5% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the firm posted $2.71 EPS. Equities analysts predict that Visa Inc. will post 11.3 EPS for the current year.

Visa Increases Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, December 1st. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, November 12th were issued a $0.67 dividend. This is a boost from Visa’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.59. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Wednesday, November 12th. This represents a $2.68 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.8%. Visa’s payout ratio is presently 26.25%.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several brokerages have recently commented on V. Erste Group Bank lowered Visa from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Monday, September 22nd. Macquarie dropped their price objective on shares of Visa from $425.00 to $410.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, October 29th. Citigroup upgraded Visa to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Thursday, October 23rd. Weiss Ratings reaffirmed a “buy (b)” rating on shares of Visa in a research report on Wednesday, October 8th. Finally, UBS Group set a $425.00 price objective on shares of Visa and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 29th. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, seventeen have assigned a Buy rating and five have issued a Hold rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $400.00.

Insider Transactions at Visa

In other news, insider Paul D. Fabara sold 2,172 shares of Visa stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, November 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $325.93, for a total transaction of $707,919.96. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider directly owned 26,413 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $8,608,789.09. The trade was a 7.60% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, Director Lloyd Carney sold 900 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, November 4th. The shares were sold at an average price of $336.48, for a total transaction of $302,832.00. Following the sale, the director owned 2,468 shares in the company, valued at approximately $830,432.64. This represents a 26.72% decrease in their position. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. Insiders have sold 24,042 shares of company stock worth $8,175,152 over the last quarter. 0.13% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

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.