Nuveen LLC Buys Shares of 10,039,755 Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Nuveen LLC bought a new stake in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) during the 1st quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The institutional investor bought 10,039,755 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock, valued at approximately $3,518,533,000. Visa makes up 1.1% of Nuveen LLC’s portfolio, making the stock its 12th largest holding.

Several other hedge funds have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. FWL Investment Management LLC grew its position in shares of Visa by 0.5% in the fourth quarter. FWL Investment Management LLC now owns 6,344 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $2,005,000 after purchasing an additional 29 shares in the last quarter. Yeomans Consulting Group Inc. grew its position in shares of Visa by 2.9% in the first quarter. Yeomans Consulting Group Inc. now owns 1,027 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $360,000 after purchasing an additional 29 shares in the last quarter. Semus Wealth Partners LLC grew its position in shares of Visa by 0.8% in the first quarter. Semus Wealth Partners LLC now owns 3,449 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $1,209,000 after purchasing an additional 29 shares in the last quarter. Capstone Financial Advisors Inc. grew its position in shares of Visa by 3.6% in the fourth quarter. Capstone Financial Advisors Inc. now owns 872 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $276,000 after purchasing an additional 30 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Headinvest LLC grew its position in shares of Visa by 0.8% in the fourth quarter. Headinvest LLC now owns 4,003 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $1,265,000 after purchasing an additional 30 shares in the last quarter. 82.15% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several equities analysts have recently weighed in on the company. William Blair reiterated an “outperform” rating on shares of Visa in a research report on Wednesday, April 30th. Citigroup started coverage on Visa in a research report on Monday, June 2nd. They set a “buy” rating for the company. Barclays restated an “overweight” rating and set a $408.00 target price (up from $396.00) on shares of Visa in a research report on Thursday, July 31st. The Goldman Sachs Group started coverage on Visa in a research report on Monday, June 2nd. They set a “neutral” rating for the company. Finally, UBS Group restated a “buy” rating and set a $415.00 target price (up from $405.00) on shares of Visa in a research report on Wednesday, July 30th. Five research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-three have assigned a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $380.84.

Visa Trading Up 1.4%

NYSE V opened at $336.86 on Friday. Visa Inc. has a 1-year low of $258.74 and a 1-year high of $375.51. The company has a current ratio of 1.12, a quick ratio of 1.12 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.52. The stock has a 50-day moving average of $352.79 and a 200-day moving average of $347.13. The firm has a market cap of $621.56 billion, a PE ratio of 32.90, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.25 and a beta of 0.94.

Visa (NYSE:V) last released its earnings results on Tuesday, July 29th. The credit-card processor reported $2.98 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.85 by $0.13. Visa had a return on equity of 58.93% and a net margin of 52.16%. The company had revenue of $10.17 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $9.82 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $2.42 EPS. Visa’s revenue for the quarter was up 14.3% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, sell-side analysts forecast that Visa Inc. will post 11.3 EPS for the current year.

Visa Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, September 2nd. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, August 12th will be paid a $0.59 dividend. This represents a $2.36 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.7%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Tuesday, August 12th. Visa’s payout ratio is 23.05%.

Insider Transactions at Visa

In other Visa news, insider Paul D. Fabara sold 11,636 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, June 11th. The stock was sold at an average price of $375.00, for a total transaction of $4,363,500.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider owned 26,413 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $9,904,875. This represents a 30.58% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Also, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,630 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, July 1st. The shares were sold at an average price of $353.82, for a total value of $3,053,466.60. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer directly owned 537 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $190,001.34. The trade was a 94.14% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last three months, insiders sold 75,100 shares of company stock valued at $27,643,224. 0.13% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

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.