Alesco Advisors LLC Reduces Stock Holdings in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Alesco Advisors LLC reduced its holdings in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 10.4% during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund owned 3,394 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after selling 394 shares during the period. Alesco Advisors LLC’s holdings in Visa were worth $1,073,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other large investors have also made changes to their positions in the company. Peterson Financial Group Inc. purchased a new stake in Visa during the third quarter worth $26,000. Decker Retirement Planning Inc. purchased a new stake in Visa during the fourth quarter worth $26,000. Bradley & Co. Private Wealth Management LLC purchased a new stake in Visa during the fourth quarter worth $27,000. POM Investment Strategies LLC boosted its holdings in Visa by 48.5% during the fourth quarter. POM Investment Strategies LLC now owns 98 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $31,000 after buying an additional 32 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Modus Advisors LLC purchased a new stake in Visa during the fourth quarter worth $32,000. 82.15% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of brokerages recently issued reports on V. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased their price target on shares of Visa from $340.00 to $375.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Friday, January 31st. Bank of America upped their price objective on shares of Visa from $331.00 to $363.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, January 31st. Morgan Stanley upped their price objective 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. Barclays upped their price objective on shares of Visa from $361.00 to $396.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Monday, February 3rd. Finally, Citigroup restated a “neutral” rating on shares of Visa in a research report on Thursday, February 13th. Six equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-three have assigned a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, Visa presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $353.96.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, CAO Peter M. Andreski sold 2,332 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, February 7th. The shares were sold at an average price of $349.62, for a total value of $815,313.84. Following the sale, the chief accounting officer now owns 4,488 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,569,094.56. This trade represents a 34.19 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,620 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, January 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $317.78, for a total transaction of $2,739,263.60. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 55,885 shares of company stock valued at $19,161,447 over the last 90 days. 0.13% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Visa Trading Down 0.3 %

Shares of V opened at $361.60 on Tuesday. The company has a current ratio of 1.12, a quick ratio of 1.12 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.45. Visa Inc. has a 12-month low of $252.70 and a 12-month high of $366.54. The firm has a 50-day moving average price of $333.92 and a 200 day moving average price of $306.64. The firm has a market capitalization of $671.77 billion, a P/E ratio of 36.45, a P/E/G ratio of 2.33 and a beta of 0.97.

Visa (NYSE:V) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, January 30th. The credit-card processor reported $2.75 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.66 by $0.09. Visa had a net margin of 54.27% and a return on equity of 54.79%. Sell-side analysts forecast that Visa Inc. will post 11.3 EPS for the current year.

Visa Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, March 3rd. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, February 11th were paid a dividend of $0.59 per share. This represents a $2.36 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.65%. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, February 11th. Visa’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 23.79%.

About Visa

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.