Jupiter Asset Management Ltd. Trims Stake in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Jupiter Asset Management Ltd. lowered its stake in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 16.7% during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 263,360 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after selling 52,856 shares during the period. Visa accounts for about 0.8% of Jupiter Asset Management Ltd.’s holdings, making the stock its 18th largest holding. Jupiter Asset Management Ltd.’s holdings in Visa were worth $83,232,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Peterson Financial Group Inc. purchased a new position in shares of Visa during the third quarter valued at about $26,000. Decker Retirement Planning Inc. bought a new stake in shares of Visa during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $26,000. Bradley & Co. Private Wealth Management LLC bought a new position in Visa in the fourth quarter worth approximately $27,000. POM Investment Strategies LLC raised its stake in Visa by 48.5% in the fourth quarter. POM Investment Strategies LLC now owns 98 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $31,000 after buying an additional 32 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Modus Advisors LLC acquired a new position in shares of Visa during the fourth quarter worth $32,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 82.15% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

V has been the topic of a number of recent analyst reports. UBS Group upped their price target on Visa from $350.00 to $400.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, January 31st. Citigroup reaffirmed a “neutral” rating on shares of Visa in a report on Thursday, February 13th. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods reiterated a “hold” rating on shares of Visa in a research report on Thursday, February 13th. Seaport Res Ptn upgraded shares of Visa from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, January 14th. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group upped their price target on shares of Visa from $346.00 to $384.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, January 31st. Six analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-three have assigned a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $353.96.

Visa Trading Down 2.8 %

Shares of V stock opened at $331.93 on Wednesday. Visa Inc. has a 1 year low of $252.70 and a 1 year high of $366.54. The firm’s fifty day simple moving average is $337.01 and its 200 day simple moving average is $309.89. The firm has a market capitalization of $616.65 billion, a P/E ratio of 33.46, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.33 and a beta of 0.95. The company has a current ratio of 1.12, a quick ratio of 1.12 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.45.

Visa (NYSE:V) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, January 30th. The credit-card processor reported $2.75 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%. As a group, sell-side analysts predict that Visa Inc. will post 11.3 EPS for the current year.

Visa Announces Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, March 3rd. Investors of record on Tuesday, February 11th were given a dividend of $0.59 per share. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, February 11th. This represents a $2.36 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.71%. Visa’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 23.79%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Visa

In other news, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,620 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, March 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $363.00, for a total value of $3,129,060.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 537 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $194,931. This represents a 94.14 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, CAO Peter M. Andreski sold 2,332 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, February 7th. The shares were sold at an average price of $349.62, for a total value of $815,313.84. Following the completion of the sale, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 4,488 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,569,094.56. This trade represents a 34.19 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last three months, insiders have sold 64,505 shares of company stock worth $22,290,507. Company insiders own 0.13% of the company’s stock.

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.