Visa Inc. $V Shares Sold by Sanders Morris Harris LLC

Key Points

• Sanders Morris Harris LLC significantly reduced its stake in Visa Inc. by 59.5% during the second quarter, now holding 3,863 shares valued at approximately $1.37 million.
• A number of institutional investors, including IMG Wealth Management Inc. and Whittier Trust Co., have either increased or adjusted their holdings in Visa, with institutional ownership now comprising 82.15% of the stock.
• Visa's latest quarterly earnings beat analysts' expectations, reporting $2.98 EPS and $10.17 billion in revenue, contributing to a year-over-year revenue increase of 14.3%.

Sanders Morris Harris LLC trimmed its holdings in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V - Free Report) by 59.5% in the second quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 3,863 shares of the credit-card processor's stock after selling 5,685 shares during the quarter. Visa comprises approximately 0.3% of Sanders Morris Harris LLC's portfolio, making the stock its 29th biggest position. Sanders Morris Harris LLC's holdings in Visa were worth $1,372,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the business. IMG Wealth Management Inc. boosted its holdings in Visa by 34.6% in the second quarter. IMG Wealth Management Inc. now owns 634 shares of the credit-card processor's stock valued at $225,000 after purchasing an additional 163 shares in the last quarter. Whittier Trust Co. of Nevada Inc. lifted its stake in Visa by 1.6% in the second quarter. Whittier Trust Co. of Nevada Inc. now owns 206,779 shares of the credit-card processor's stock valued at $73,415,000 after buying an additional 3,325 shares during the last quarter. Whittier Trust Co. lifted its stake in Visa by 5.5% in the second quarter. Whittier Trust Co. now owns 413,713 shares of the credit-card processor's stock valued at $146,884,000 after buying an additional 21,484 shares during the last quarter. Lafayette Investments Inc. lifted its stake in Visa by 2.6% in the second quarter. Lafayette Investments Inc. now owns 8,184 shares of the credit-card processor's stock valued at $2,906,000 after buying an additional 205 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Syntegra Private Wealth Group LLC lifted its stake in Visa by 1.2% in the second quarter. Syntegra Private Wealth Group LLC now owns 10,222 shares of the credit-card processor's stock valued at $3,629,000 after buying an additional 124 shares during the last quarter. 82.15% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, General Counsel Julie B. Rottenberg sold 2,027 shares of the company's stock in a transaction 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 represents a 14.53% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 10,485 shares of the company's stock in a transaction on Wednesday, October 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $342.30, for a total value of $3,589,015.50. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer directly owned 537 shares in the company, valued at $183,815.10. This represents a 95.13% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Corporate insiders own 0.13% of the company's stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of brokerages have weighed in on V. Barclays reiterated an "overweight" rating and issued a $408.00 price objective (up previously from $396.00) on shares of Visa in a research note on Thursday, July 31st. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft began coverage on Visa in a research note on Thursday, July 17th. They issued a "buy" rating and a $410.00 price objective for the company. Oppenheimer boosted their price objective on Visa from $390.00 to $391.00 and gave the company an "outperform" rating in a research note on Wednesday, July 2nd. Wells Fargo & Company upgraded Visa to a "strong-buy" rating in a research note on Wednesday. Finally, KeyCorp reiterated an "overweight" rating and issued a $405.00 price objective on shares of Visa in a research note on Wednesday. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty have issued a Buy rating and five have assigned a Hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average price target of $392.75.

Visa Price Performance

Visa stock opened at $345.82 on Friday. Visa Inc. has a 12 month low of $280.78 and a 12 month high of $375.51. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.52, a current ratio of 1.12 and a quick ratio of 1.12. The business has a 50 day simple moving average of $344.73 and a 200-day simple moving average of $347.33. The stock has a market capitalization of $633.81 billion, a PE ratio of 33.77, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.04 and a beta of 0.90.

Visa (NYSE:V - Get Free Report) last released 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 return on equity of 58.93% and a net margin of 52.16%.The business had revenue of $10.17 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $9.82 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business earned $2.42 earnings per share. The company's quarterly revenue was up 14.3% compared to the same quarter last year. Equities analysts predict that Visa Inc. will post 11.3 earnings per share for the current year.

Visa Announces Dividend

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

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.

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