Washington Trust Advisors Inc. Reduces Holdings in Visa Inc. $V

Washington Trust Advisors Inc. reduced its stake in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 0.7% during the second quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The firm owned 143,503 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after selling 996 shares during the quarter. Visa makes up about 4.1% of Washington Trust Advisors Inc.’s portfolio, making the stock its 5th largest holding. Washington Trust Advisors Inc.’s holdings in Visa were worth $50,951,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other hedge funds have also recently made changes to their positions in V. Keystone Global Partners LLC bought a new position in Visa in the 1st quarter valued at approximately $26,000. von Borstel & Associates Inc. bought a new position in Visa in the 1st quarter valued at approximately $27,000. Family Legacy Financial Solutions LLC bought a new position in Visa in the 2nd quarter valued at approximately $28,000. Harbor Asset Planning Inc. bought a new position in Visa in the 2nd quarter valued at approximately $29,000. Finally, Cranbrook Wealth Management LLC lifted its position in Visa by 82.0% in the 2nd quarter. Cranbrook Wealth Management LLC now owns 91 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $32,000 after acquiring an additional 41 shares in the last quarter. 82.15% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Visa news, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 10,485 shares of the stock in a transaction on Wednesday, October 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $342.30, for a total value of $3,589,015.50. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer owned 537 shares in the company, valued at approximately $183,815.10. This represents a 95.13% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, General Counsel Julie B. Rottenberg sold 2,027 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, August 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $344.02, for a total value of $697,328.54. Following the completion of the sale, the general counsel owned 11,925 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $4,102,438.50. The trade was a 14.53% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Corporate insiders own 0.13% of the company’s stock.

Visa Trading Up 0.4%

NYSE:V opened at $347.34 on Monday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.52, a current ratio of 1.12 and a quick ratio of 1.12. The firm has a market capitalization of $636.60 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 33.92, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.05 and a beta of 0.90. Visa Inc. has a one year low of $280.78 and a one year high of $375.51. The business has a fifty day moving average price of $344.79 and a 200-day moving average price of $347.98.

Visa (NYSE:V) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, July 29th. The credit-card processor reported $2.98 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping 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 business had revenue of $10.17 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $9.82 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business posted $2.42 EPS. Visa’s revenue for the quarter was up 14.3% compared to the same quarter last year. Sell-side analysts forecast that Visa Inc. will post 11.3 EPS for the current year.

Visa Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, September 2nd. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, August 12th were paid a $0.59 dividend. This represents a $2.36 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.7%. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, August 12th. Visa’s dividend payout ratio is presently 23.05%.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several research firms recently issued reports on V. Erste Group Bank cut Visa from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Monday, September 22nd. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft initiated coverage on Visa in a report on Thursday, July 17th. They set a “buy” rating and a $410.00 price target on the stock. Wells Fargo & Company raised Visa to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 22nd. Weiss Ratings reissued a “buy (b)” rating on shares of Visa in a report on Friday. Finally, UBS Group reissued a “buy” rating and set a $415.00 price target (up from $405.00) on shares of Visa in a report on Wednesday, July 30th. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, nineteen have given a Buy rating and five have given a Hold rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, Visa currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $392.75.

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.