Hennessy Advisors Inc. Sells 1,000 Shares of Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Hennessy Advisors Inc. reduced its stake in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V - Free Report) by 17.2% during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 4,800 shares of the credit-card processor's stock after selling 1,000 shares during the period. Hennessy Advisors Inc.'s holdings in Visa were worth $1,517,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Custom Index Systems LLC acquired a new position in shares of Visa during the third quarter worth about $731,000. Copley Financial Group Inc. purchased a new position in shares of Visa during the 3rd quarter worth approximately $616,000. FORA Capital LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Visa in the 3rd quarter valued at approximately $7,987,000. Chicago Capital LLC boosted its stake in shares of Visa by 5.2% in the third quarter. Chicago Capital LLC now owns 404,914 shares of the credit-card processor's stock valued at $111,331,000 after buying an additional 20,023 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Nexus Investment Management ULC grew its holdings in Visa by 5,034.0% during the third quarter. Nexus Investment Management ULC now owns 56,371 shares of the credit-card processor's stock worth $15,499,000 after acquiring an additional 55,273 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 82.15% of the company's stock.

Insider Transactions at Visa

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

Analysts Set New Price Targets

V has been the topic of a number of analyst reports. Morgan Stanley raised their target price on shares of Visa from $326.00 to $371.00 and gave the stock an "overweight" rating in a research report on Wednesday, December 18th. Macquarie increased their target price on Visa from $300.00 to $335.00 and gave the stock an "outperform" rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. TD Cowen increased their price objective on shares of Visa from $318.00 to $325.00 and gave the stock a "buy" rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Piper Sandler boosted their target price on shares of Visa from $319.00 to $322.00 and gave the company an "overweight" rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Finally, Seaport Res Ptn raised shares of Visa from a "hold" rating to a "strong-buy" rating in a research note on Tuesday, January 14th. Four equities 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. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average target price of $331.92.

Visa Trading Up 0.9 %

NYSE V traded up $2.72 on Friday, hitting $319.97. 5,746,152 shares of the company were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 5,703,089. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.55, a current ratio of 1.28 and a quick ratio of 1.28. Visa Inc. has a twelve month low of $252.70 and a twelve month high of $321.61. The firm has a market capitalization of $596.06 billion, a P/E ratio of 32.88, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.06 and a beta of 0.96. The company's 50 day moving average price is $313.41 and its 200-day moving average price is $288.59.

Visa (NYSE:V - Get Free Report) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 29th. The credit-card processor reported $2.71 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts' consensus estimates of $2.58 by $0.13. The firm had revenue of $9.62 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $9.49 billion. Visa had a return on equity of 53.16% and a net margin of 54.96%. The business's quarterly revenue was up 11.7% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the company posted $2.33 EPS. Analysts predict that Visa Inc. will post 11.22 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Visa Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, December 2nd. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, November 12th were given a $0.59 dividend. This is a positive change from Visa's previous quarterly dividend of $0.52. This represents a $2.36 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.74%. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, November 12th. Visa's dividend payout ratio is presently 24.25%.

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.