Visa (NYSE:V) Given New $315.00 Price Target at Royal Bank of Canada

Visa (NYSE:V) had its price objective boosted by Royal Bank of Canada from $309.00 to $315.00 in a research note issued to investors on Wednesday morning, Benzinga reports. Royal Bank of Canada currently has an outperform rating on the credit-card processor’s stock.

Several other brokerages have also recently weighed in on V. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price target on Visa from $300.00 to $325.00 and gave the company an overweight rating in a research report on Wednesday, March 6th. Evercore ISI lifted their price target on Visa from $325.00 to $335.00 and gave the company an outperform rating in a research report on Tuesday, March 26th. Mizuho restated a neutral rating and set a $265.00 target price on shares of Visa in a research report on Wednesday, March 27th. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods boosted their target price on Visa from $305.00 to $315.00 and gave the stock an outperform rating in a research report on Friday, January 26th. Finally, UBS Group boosted their target price on Visa from $315.00 to $325.00 and gave the stock a buy rating in a research report on Wednesday. Five research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and twenty have given a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of Moderate Buy and a consensus target price of $302.58.

Visa Price Performance

Shares of NYSE V opened at $274.52 on Wednesday. The stock has a market cap of $504.16 billion, a PE ratio of 30.67, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.89 and a beta of 0.96. Visa has a fifty-two week low of $216.14 and a fifty-two week high of $290.96. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.53, a quick ratio of 1.45 and a current ratio of 1.40. The stock has a fifty day moving average of $279.24 and a 200-day moving average of $264.52.

Visa (NYSE:V) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, April 23rd. The credit-card processor reported $2.51 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.43 by $0.08. The company had revenue of $8.78 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $8.62 billion. Visa had a return on equity of 51.23% and a net margin of 53.87%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 9.9% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the business earned $2.09 earnings per share. Equities research analysts anticipate that Visa will post 9.89 earnings per share for the current year.

Visa Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, June 3rd. Stockholders of record on Friday, May 17th will be paid a $0.52 dividend. This represents a $2.08 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.76%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, May 16th. Visa’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 23.24%.

Insider Activity

In other news, Director Lloyd Carney sold 909 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, April 26th. The stock was sold at an average price of $275.55, for a total value of $250,474.95. Following the completion of the sale, the director now owns 2,591 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $713,950.05. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. In other news, Director Lloyd Carney sold 909 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, April 26th. The stock was sold at an average price of $275.55, for a total value of $250,474.95. Following the completion of the sale, the director now owns 2,591 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $713,950.05. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,200 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, April 1st. The shares were sold at an average price of $280.36, for a total value of $2,298,952.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 538 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $150,833.68. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last quarter, insiders sold 19,874 shares of company stock valued at $5,506,827. Insiders own 0.19% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the business. Norges Bank purchased a new position in shares of Visa during the 4th quarter worth approximately $3,895,015,000. International Assets Investment Management LLC raised its holdings in Visa by 17,418.7% in the 4th quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC now owns 4,737,229 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $1,233,338,000 after purchasing an additional 4,710,188 shares during the period. FMR LLC raised its holdings in Visa by 4.7% in the 3rd quarter. FMR LLC now owns 50,357,747 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $11,582,785,000 after purchasing an additional 2,257,605 shares during the period. J.P. Morgan Private Wealth Advisors LLC bought a new position in Visa in the 3rd quarter worth $358,349,000. Finally, Public Employees Retirement Association of Colorado raised its holdings in Visa by 14,306.3% in the 4th quarter. Public Employees Retirement Association of Colorado now owns 1,500,270 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $390,595,000 after purchasing an additional 1,489,856 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 82.15% of the company’s stock.

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.