Visa Inc. $V Shares Sold by Tocqueville Asset Management L.P.

Key Points

• Tocqueville Asset Management L.P. reduced its stake in Visa Inc. by 2.4% in the first quarter, owning 85,935 shares worth approximately $30.1 million following the sale of 2,074 shares.
• CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,630 shares of Visa stock, resulting in a 94.14% decrease in his ownership, while insider sales totaled $27.6 million over the last 90 days.
• Visa recently reported a quarterly revenue of $10.17 billion and an earnings per share of $2.98, beating analyst estimates, and declared a dividend of $0.59 per share scheduled for payout on September 2nd.

Tocqueville Asset Management L.P. reduced its holdings in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V - Free Report) by 2.4% during the 1st quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 85,935 shares of the credit-card processor's stock after selling 2,074 shares during the period. Tocqueville Asset Management L.P.'s holdings in Visa were worth $30,117,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently modified their holdings of the company. GAMMA Investing LLC raised its stake in Visa by 38,416.3% during the first quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 14,761,375 shares of the credit-card processor's stock worth $5,173,271,000 after purchasing an additional 14,723,050 shares during the period. Nuveen LLC purchased a new position in Visa during the first quarter worth about $3,518,533,000. Northern Trust Corp raised its stake in Visa by 18.0% during the fourth quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 18,260,714 shares of the credit-card processor's stock worth $5,771,116,000 after purchasing an additional 2,785,707 shares during the period. Universal Beteiligungs und Servicegesellschaft mbH purchased a new position in Visa during the fourth quarter worth about $673,689,000. Finally, Kovitz Investment Group Partners LLC raised its stake in Visa by 295.4% during the fourth quarter. Kovitz Investment Group Partners LLC now owns 2,362,202 shares of the credit-card processor's stock worth $746,550,000 after purchasing an additional 1,764,781 shares during the period. 82.15% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of brokerages have commented on V. Morgan Stanley lifted their target price on shares of Visa from $386.00 to $402.00 and gave the stock an "overweight" rating in a research note on Wednesday, July 30th. Citigroup began coverage on shares of Visa in a research note on Monday, June 2nd. They set a "buy" rating on the stock. Macquarie lifted their target price on shares of Visa from $380.00 to $425.00 and gave the stock an "outperform" rating in a research note on Thursday, July 31st. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft started coverage on shares of Visa in a research note on Thursday, July 17th. They set a "buy" rating and a $410.00 target price on the stock. Finally, Wall Street Zen raised shares of Visa from a "hold" rating to a "buy" rating in a research note on Monday, May 12th. Five investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-three have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average price target of $380.84.

Visa Stock Down 0.3%

NYSE V traded down $1.05 on Friday, hitting $344.44. 4,945,855 shares of the stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 6,424,159. The company has a quick ratio of 1.12, a current ratio of 1.12 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.52. Visa Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $265.23 and a fifty-two week high of $375.51. The company has a market cap of $631.29 billion, a PE ratio of 33.64, a PEG ratio of 2.29 and a beta of 0.94. The company has a 50-day moving average price of $350.17 and a 200-day moving average price of $347.44.

Visa (NYSE:V - Get Free Report) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, July 29th. The credit-card processor reported $2.98 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.85 by $0.13. Visa had a net margin of 52.16% and a return on equity of 58.93%. The company had revenue of $10.17 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $9.82 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business posted $2.42 EPS. The firm's revenue was up 14.3% on a year-over-year basis. Sell-side analysts anticipate that Visa Inc. will post 11.3 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Visa Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, September 2nd. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, August 12th will be given a dividend of $0.59 per share. This represents a $2.36 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.7%. The ex-dividend date is Tuesday, August 12th. Visa's payout ratio is currently 23.05%.

Insider Activity at Visa

In other news, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,630 shares of the business's stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, July 1st. The shares were sold at an average price of $353.82, for a total transaction of $3,053,466.60. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer owned 537 shares in the company, valued at approximately $190,001.34. The trade was a 94.14% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Also, insider Paul D. Fabara sold 11,636 shares of the business's stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, June 11th. The stock was sold at an average price of $375.00, for a total transaction of $4,363,500.00. Following the sale, the insider owned 26,413 shares of the company's stock, valued at $9,904,875. This represents a 30.58% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 75,100 shares of company stock valued at $27,643,224 in the last 90 days. 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.