Birch Hill Investment Advisors LLC Raises Position in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Birch Hill Investment Advisors LLC increased its holdings in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 18.1% during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 2,437 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after purchasing an additional 374 shares during the quarter. Birch Hill Investment Advisors LLC’s holdings in Visa were worth $634,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

A number of other large investors also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the business. State Street Corp raised its position in Visa by 3.7% in the 1st quarter. State Street Corp now owns 72,897,112 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $16,435,339,000 after purchasing an additional 2,572,159 shares during the period. Morgan Stanley raised its position in Visa by 13.0% in the 4th quarter. Morgan Stanley now owns 51,122,866 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $10,621,287,000 after purchasing an additional 5,864,340 shares during the period. FMR LLC raised its position 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. Moneta Group Investment Advisors LLC raised its position in Visa by 116,608.6% in the 4th quarter. Moneta Group Investment Advisors LLC now owns 24,504,130 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $5,090,978,000 after purchasing an additional 24,483,134 shares during the period. Finally, Northern Trust Corp raised its position in Visa by 4.7% in the 3rd quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 17,073,700 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $3,927,122,000 after purchasing an additional 763,505 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 82.15% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities analysts recently commented on V shares. TD Cowen started coverage on shares of Visa in a research report on Thursday. They issued a “buy” rating and a $320.00 target price on the stock. Raymond James boosted their price objective on shares of Visa from $287.00 to $311.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Friday, January 26th. Monness Crespi & Hardt initiated coverage on shares of Visa in a research report on Wednesday, December 20th. They issued a “neutral” rating on the stock. Mizuho restated a “neutral” rating and issued a $265.00 price objective on shares of Visa in a research report on Wednesday, March 27th. Finally, William Blair restated an “outperform” rating on shares of Visa in a research report on Friday, January 26th. Five analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and nineteen have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $296.87.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, insider Rajat Taneja sold 36,546 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, January 19th. The shares were sold at an average price of $270.20, for a total transaction of $9,874,729.20. Following the sale, the insider now owns 232,112 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $62,716,662.40. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. In other news, insider Rajat Taneja sold 36,546 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, January 19th. The shares were sold at an average price of $270.20, for a total value of $9,874,729.20. Following the transaction, the insider now owns 232,112 shares in the company, valued at $62,716,662.40. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 8,150 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, February 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $273.39, for a total transaction of $2,228,128.50. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 55,511 shares of company stock valued at $15,131,081 over the last quarter. Corporate insiders own 0.19% of the company’s stock.

Visa Trading Up 0.1 %

NYSE:V opened at $275.96 on Friday. Visa Inc. has a one year low of $216.14 and a one year high of $290.96. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.54, a current ratio of 1.45 and a quick ratio of 1.45. The company’s 50-day simple moving average is $280.13 and its 200 day simple moving average is $261.69. The firm has a market capitalization of $506.80 billion, a P/E ratio of 31.76, a PEG ratio of 1.91 and a beta of 0.96.

Visa (NYSE:V) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, January 25th. The credit-card processor reported $2.41 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.34 by $0.07. Visa had a net margin of 53.92% and a return on equity of 50.02%. The business had revenue of $8.63 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $8.55 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $2.18 earnings per share. Visa’s quarterly revenue was up 9.3% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, analysts forecast that Visa Inc. will post 9.89 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Visa Announces Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, March 1st. Investors of record on Friday, February 9th were paid a dividend of $0.52 per share. This represents a $2.08 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.75%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, February 8th. Visa’s payout ratio is currently 23.94%.

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.