Berkshire Asset Management LLC PA Has $1.77 Million Position in Visa Inc. $V

Berkshire Asset Management LLC PA lowered its holdings in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 9.2% during the first quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The firm owned 5,039 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after selling 513 shares during the period. Berkshire Asset Management LLC PA’s holdings in Visa were worth $1,770,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently bought and sold shares of V. GAMMA Investing LLC boosted its stake in Visa by 38,416.3% in the first quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 14,761,375 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $5,173,271,000 after purchasing an additional 14,723,050 shares in the last quarter. Nuveen LLC acquired a new position in Visa in the first quarter worth $3,518,533,000. Northern Trust Corp raised its position in shares of Visa by 18.0% during the fourth quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 18,260,714 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $5,771,116,000 after acquiring an additional 2,785,707 shares during the last quarter. Universal Beteiligungs und Servicegesellschaft mbH bought a new stake in shares of Visa during the fourth quarter worth $673,689,000. Finally, Kovitz Investment Group Partners LLC raised its position in shares of Visa by 295.4% during the fourth quarter. Kovitz Investment Group Partners LLC now owns 2,362,202 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $746,550,000 after acquiring an additional 1,764,781 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 82.15% of the company’s stock.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, insider Paul D. Fabara sold 11,636 shares of Visa stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, June 11th. The stock was sold at an average price of $375.00, for a total value of $4,363,500.00. Following the sale, the insider owned 26,413 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $9,904,875. This trade represents a 30.58% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,630 shares of Visa 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 completion of the sale, the chief executive officer directly owned 537 shares in the company, valued at approximately $190,001.34. This represents 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 worth $27,643,224. 0.13% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities research analysts have recently weighed in on the company. Citigroup assumed coverage on Visa in a research report on Monday, June 2nd. They set a “buy” rating for the company. UBS Group restated a “buy” rating and set a $415.00 target price (up previously from $405.00) on shares of Visa in a research report on Wednesday, July 30th. Morgan Stanley boosted their target price on Visa from $386.00 to $402.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, July 30th. Barclays restated an “overweight” rating and set a $408.00 target price (up previously from $396.00) on shares of Visa in a research report on Thursday, July 31st. Finally, Wall Street Zen upgraded Visa from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday, May 12th. Five investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-three have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, Visa has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $380.84.

Visa Stock Down 0.5%

NYSE:V opened at $342.81 on Tuesday. Visa Inc. has a 1 year low of $265.23 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 market cap of $628.30 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 33.48, a PEG ratio of 2.29 and a beta of 0.94. The stock has a 50-day moving average price of $349.69 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $347.45.

Visa (NYSE:V) last posted its earnings results on Tuesday, July 29th. The credit-card processor reported $2.98 earnings per share (EPS) 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 firm had revenue of $10.17 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $9.82 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $2.42 earnings per share. The company’s revenue was up 14.3% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, equities analysts expect that Visa Inc. will post 11.3 earnings per share for the current year.

Visa Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, September 2nd. Investors of record on Tuesday, August 12th will be issued a dividend of $0.59 per share. The ex-dividend date is Tuesday, August 12th. This represents a $2.36 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.7%. Visa’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 23.05%.

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.