Visa Inc. $V Shares Purchased by Balefire LLC

Key Points

• Balefire LLC increased its stake in Visa Inc. by 120.5% in the second quarter, holding shares valued at $1,541,000 after purchasing 2,372 additional shares.
• Several institutional investors, including GAMMA Investing LLC and Vanguard Group Inc., have significantly increased their positions in Visa, reflecting a robust interest, with institutional ownership at 82.15%.
• Visa's shares have received multiple optimistic ratings, including an "overweight" rating from Barclays with a target price increase to $408.00, as well as reports of strong quarterly earnings that exceeded analyst estimates.

Balefire LLC grew its stake in shares of Visa Inc. (NYSE:V - Free Report) by 120.5% in the 2nd quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 4,340 shares of the credit-card processor's stock after buying an additional 2,372 shares during the period. Balefire LLC's holdings in Visa were worth $1,541,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also made changes to their positions in the company. GAMMA Investing LLC increased its position in shares of Visa by 38,416.3% in 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 acquiring an additional 14,723,050 shares in the last quarter. Nuveen LLC purchased a new stake in Visa during the 1st quarter worth $3,518,533,000. Universal Beteiligungs und Servicegesellschaft mbH purchased a new stake in Visa during the 4th quarter worth $673,689,000. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC increased its holdings in Visa by 14.9% in the 4th quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC now owns 13,321,754 shares of the credit-card processor's stock valued at $4,210,207,000 after purchasing an additional 1,723,785 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Vanguard Group Inc. raised its position in Visa by 1.1% in the first quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 161,082,431 shares of the credit-card processor's stock valued at $56,452,949,000 after purchasing an additional 1,677,088 shares during the period. 82.15% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several brokerages have recently weighed in on V. Barclays reaffirmed an "overweight" rating and issued a $408.00 target price (up previously from $396.00) on shares of Visa in a research report on Thursday, July 31st. Raymond James Financial restated an "outperform" rating on shares of Visa in a report on Wednesday, July 30th. Oppenheimer lifted their price objective on shares of Visa from $390.00 to $391.00 and gave the company an "outperform" rating in a research note on Wednesday, July 2nd. Jefferies Financial Group boosted their target price on shares of Visa from $400.00 to $410.00 and gave the stock a "buy" rating in a research report on Tuesday, May 27th. Finally, UBS Group reaffirmed a "buy" rating and set a $415.00 price target (up from $405.00) on shares of Visa in a report on Wednesday, July 30th. One analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty have issued a Buy rating and five have issued a Hold rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average target price of $385.96.

Insider Activity at Visa

In other Visa news, General Counsel Julie B. Rottenberg sold 2,027 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, August 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $344.02, for a total transaction of $697,328.54. Following the transaction, the general counsel owned 11,925 shares of the company's stock, valued at $4,102,438.50. This trade represents a 14.53% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Also, 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 value of $3,053,466.60. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer owned 537 shares of the company's stock, valued at $190,001.34. This trade represents a 94.14% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Corporate insiders own 0.13% of the company's stock.

Visa Stock Up 0.3%

V stock opened at $339.92 on Wednesday. The company has a current ratio of 1.12, a quick ratio of 1.12 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.52. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $346.38 and a 200-day simple moving average of $346.64. The company has a market capitalization of $623.00 billion, a P/E ratio of 33.20, a PEG ratio of 2.26 and a beta of 0.92. Visa Inc. has a twelve month low of $268.23 and a twelve month high of $375.51.

Visa (NYSE:V - Get Free Report) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, July 29th. The credit-card processor reported $2.98 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts' consensus estimates of $2.85 by $0.13. The firm had revenue of $10.17 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $9.82 billion. Visa had a net margin of 52.16% and a return on equity of 58.93%. The firm's revenue was up 14.3% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted $2.42 EPS. On average, equities research analysts predict that Visa Inc. will post 11.3 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Visa Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, September 2nd. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, August 12th were paid a dividend of $0.59 per share. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, August 12th. This represents a $2.36 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.7%. Visa's dividend payout ratio is presently 23.05%.

Visa Company 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.

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