1,431 Shares in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) Bought by M.E. Allison & CO. Inc.

M.E. Allison & CO. Inc. bought a new stake in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V - Free Report) in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor bought 1,431 shares of the credit-card processor's stock, valued at approximately $452,000.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also modified their holdings of V. State Street Corp grew its holdings in shares of Visa by 4.5% during the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 76,610,942 shares of the credit-card processor's stock valued at $21,064,179,000 after acquiring an additional 3,327,977 shares in the last quarter. FMR LLC grew its stake in Visa by 6.1% in the third quarter. FMR LLC now owns 57,111,843 shares of the credit-card processor's stock valued at $15,702,901,000 after purchasing an additional 3,265,518 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC increased its position in Visa by 7.7% in the 3rd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 38,655,250 shares of the credit-card processor's stock worth $10,601,135,000 after purchasing an additional 2,772,549 shares during the last quarter. Ameriprise Financial Inc. raised its stake in shares of Visa by 2.4% during the 2nd quarter. Ameriprise Financial Inc. now owns 14,610,590 shares of the credit-card processor's stock worth $3,833,981,000 after purchasing an additional 345,829 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Legal & General Group Plc lifted its holdings in shares of Visa by 2.2% during the 2nd quarter. Legal & General Group Plc now owns 14,416,394 shares of the credit-card processor's stock valued at $3,783,857,000 after buying an additional 312,286 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 82.15% of the company's stock.

Insider Transactions at Visa

In other Visa news, insider Paul D. Fabara sold 2,171 shares of the business's stock in a transaction dated Friday, November 22nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $307.97, for a total value of $668,602.87. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now directly owns 17,894 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $5,510,815.18. The trade was a 10.82 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,620 shares of the company's stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, January 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $317.78, for a total transaction of $2,739,263.60. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Company insiders own 0.13% of the company's stock.

Visa Price Performance

Shares of V traded up $0.16 during mid-day trading on Wednesday, reaching $323.79. The company had a trading volume of 2,706,953 shares, compared to its average volume of 5,502,607. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.55, a current ratio of 1.28 and a quick ratio of 1.28. The company has a market capitalization of $603.17 billion, a P/E ratio of 33.26, a P/E/G ratio of 2.15 and a beta of 0.96. Visa Inc. has a twelve month low of $252.70 and a twelve month high of $325.74. The company's 50-day moving average is $313.86 and its 200-day moving average is $289.47.

Visa (NYSE:V - Get Free Report) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 29th. The credit-card processor reported $2.71 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.58 by $0.13. Visa had a return on equity of 53.16% and a net margin of 54.96%. The firm had revenue of $9.62 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $9.49 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the company posted $2.33 earnings per share. The business's revenue for the quarter was up 11.7% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, equities analysts anticipate that Visa Inc. will post 11.2 EPS for the current year.

Visa Increases Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, December 2nd. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, November 12th were paid a dividend of $0.59 per share. This represents a $2.36 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.73%. This is a boost from Visa's previous quarterly dividend of $0.52. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, November 12th. Visa's dividend payout ratio is currently 24.25%.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several equities analysts have commented on the stock. Oppenheimer increased their target price on shares of Visa from $321.00 to $375.00 and gave the stock an "outperform" rating in a research report on Thursday, December 19th. Jefferies Financial Group raised their price objective on Visa from $320.00 to $330.00 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. BMO Capital Markets upped their target price on Visa from $310.00 to $320.00 and gave the stock an "outperform" rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods lifted their price target on shares of Visa from $335.00 to $360.00 and gave the company an "outperform" rating in a research report on Monday, December 9th. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada upped their price objective on shares of Visa from $311.00 to $322.00 and gave the stock an "outperform" rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Four research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-four have assigned a buy rating and two have issued a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus price target of $332.81.

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.