Birch Hill Investment Advisors LLC Raises Position in Visa Inc. $V

Key Points

• Birch Hill Investment Advisors LLC raised its Visa stake by 37.6% in Q4 to 12,955 shares, worth about $4.54 million, and institutional investors now own roughly 82.15% of the stock.
• Visa beat Q4 expectations with EPS of $3.17 versus $3.14 and revenue of $10.90 billion versus $10.69 billion, a 14.6% year-over-year revenue increase, while reporting a 50.23% net margin and 61.74% ROE.
• Wall Street sentiment is broadly positive—MarketBeat shows a consensus Buy rating with an average target of $388.88—while Visa trades near $314 with a $570 billion market cap and a 0.9% dividend yield ($2.68 annual).

Birch Hill Investment Advisors LLC raised its position in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V - Free Report) by 37.6% during the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund owned 12,955 shares of the credit-card processor's stock after buying an additional 3,538 shares during the period. Birch Hill Investment Advisors LLC's holdings in Visa were worth $4,544,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other large investors also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Sonoma Allocations LLC acquired a new position in Visa during the third quarter worth $710,000. Invariant Investment Management acquired a new stake in shares of Visa in the 4th quarter worth $969,000. Loring Wolcott & Coolidge Fiduciary Advisors LLP MA raised its holdings in shares of Visa by 2.6% during the 3rd quarter. Loring Wolcott & Coolidge Fiduciary Advisors LLP MA now owns 574,043 shares of the credit-card processor's stock worth $198,596,000 after acquiring an additional 14,581 shares during the period. Federated Hermes Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Visa by 24.1% during the 3rd quarter. Federated Hermes Inc. now owns 823,262 shares of the credit-card processor's stock worth $281,045,000 after acquiring an additional 159,906 shares during the period. Finally, Parnassus Investments LLC boosted its position in shares of Visa by 3.0% during the 3rd quarter. Parnassus Investments LLC now owns 274,141 shares of the credit-card processor's stock valued at $93,586,000 after acquiring an additional 8,061 shares during the last quarter. 82.15% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Visa Trading Down 0.9%

NYSE V opened at $314.14 on Tuesday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.51, a current ratio of 1.11 and a quick ratio of 1.11. The stock has a market capitalization of $570.22 billion, a P/E ratio of 29.47, a PEG ratio of 1.82 and a beta of 0.80. The firm's 50-day moving average is $311.02 and its two-hundred day moving average is $328.98. Visa Inc. has a 12 month low of $293.89 and a 12 month high of $375.51.

Visa (NYSE:V - Get Free Report) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, January 29th. The credit-card processor reported $3.17 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts' consensus estimates of $3.14 by $0.03. The business had revenue of $10.90 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $10.69 billion. Visa had a net margin of 50.23% and a return on equity of 61.74%. The business's revenue for the quarter was up 14.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the business earned $2.75 earnings per share. On average, sell-side analysts anticipate that Visa Inc. will post 12.84 earnings per share for the current year.

Visa Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, March 2nd. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, February 10th were given a $0.67 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, February 10th. This represents a $2.68 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.9%. Visa's payout ratio is presently 25.14%.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

V has been the subject of several recent analyst reports. Piper Sandler set a $160.00 price objective on shares of Visa in a research report on Wednesday, January 28th. Weiss Ratings cut shares of Visa from a "buy (b-)" rating to a "hold (c+)" rating in a research note on Thursday. Cantor Fitzgerald upgraded shares of Visa to a "strong-buy" rating in a report on Tuesday, January 27th. Daiwa Securities Group raised shares of Visa from a "neutral" rating to an "outperform" rating and set a $370.00 price target on the stock in a research report on Monday, February 2nd. Finally, Rothschild & Co Redburn set a $385.00 price objective on Visa in a report on Wednesday, January 28th. Six research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty have issued a Buy rating and three have assigned a Hold rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, Visa currently has a consensus rating of "Buy" and an average target price of $388.88.

Insider Transactions at Visa

In other Visa news, Director Lloyd Carney sold 650 shares of the company's stock in a transaction on Wednesday, March 11th. The stock was sold at an average price of $309.62, for a total transaction of $201,253.00. Following the transaction, the director directly owned 2,679 shares in the company, valued at $829,471.98. This represents a 19.53% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. 0.12% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Visa Company Profile

Visa Inc is a global payments technology company that facilitates electronic funds transfers and digital commerce by connecting consumers, merchants, financial institutions and governments. The firm operates one of the world's largest payment networks, providing processing, authorization, clearing and settlement services for credit, debit and prepaid card transactions. Visa's network-based model enables partner banks and other issuers to offer branded payment products while Visa focuses on the infrastructure, standards and technologies that move money securely and efficiently around the world.

Visa's product and service portfolio includes card-based payment products for consumers and businesses, real-time push-payment capabilities, tokenization and authentication services, fraud and risk-management tools, data analytics and APIs for fintech and merchant integration.

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