Wallington Asset Management LLC Cuts Stock Holdings in Visa Inc. $V

Wallington Asset Management LLC trimmed its holdings in shares of Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 17.4% in the 2nd quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund owned 68,150 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after selling 14,345 shares during the quarter. Visa accounts for approximately 3.4% of Wallington Asset Management LLC’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 9th largest holding. Wallington Asset Management LLC’s holdings in Visa were worth $24,197,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other large investors have also recently made changes to their positions in V. Brighton Jones LLC grew its stake in Visa by 50.1% in the 4th quarter. Brighton Jones LLC now owns 20,635 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $6,522,000 after acquiring an additional 6,883 shares in the last quarter. Revolve Wealth Partners LLC raised its stake in shares of Visa by 68.9% during the fourth quarter. Revolve Wealth Partners LLC now owns 11,811 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $3,733,000 after acquiring an additional 4,817 shares in the last quarter. Wedge Capital Management L L P NC boosted its holdings in shares of Visa by 4.7% in the first quarter. Wedge Capital Management L L P NC now owns 2,562 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock valued at $898,000 after purchasing an additional 116 shares during the period. Cedar Mountain Advisors LLC grew its stake in Visa by 28.5% in the first quarter. Cedar Mountain Advisors LLC now owns 167 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $59,000 after purchasing an additional 37 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Bennett Selby Investments LP increased its holdings in Visa by 1.7% during the 1st quarter. Bennett Selby Investments LP now owns 55,727 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $19,530,000 after purchasing an additional 953 shares during the period. 82.15% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several brokerages have weighed in on V. Oppenheimer upped their target price on Visa from $390.00 to $391.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, July 2nd. Erste Group Bank lowered shares of Visa from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Monday, September 22nd. UBS Group reissued a “buy” rating and set a $415.00 target price (up previously from $405.00) on shares of Visa in a research report on Wednesday, July 30th. Robert W. Baird set a $410.00 price target on shares of Visa and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Monday. Finally, Truist Financial dropped their price objective on shares of Visa from $400.00 to $397.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, July 17th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-one have assigned a Buy rating and five have assigned a Hold rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, Visa has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $389.00.

Visa Stock Down 0.2%

NYSE:V opened at $349.21 on Tuesday. The company’s 50-day simple moving average is $343.65 and its 200-day simple moving average is $346.89. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.52, a quick ratio of 1.12 and a current ratio of 1.12. Visa Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $273.24 and a fifty-two week high of $375.51. The stock has a market capitalization of $640.03 billion, a P/E ratio of 34.10, a P/E/G ratio of 2.07 and a beta of 0.90.

Visa (NYSE:V) last posted its earnings results 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 company had revenue of $10.17 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $9.82 billion. Visa had a net margin of 52.16% and a return on equity of 58.93%. Visa’s revenue for the quarter was up 14.3% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company posted $2.42 earnings per share. On average, equities analysts anticipate that Visa Inc. will post 11.3 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Visa Dividend Announcement

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

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, General Counsel Julie B. Rottenberg sold 2,027 shares of the business’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 directly owned 11,925 shares in the company, valued at $4,102,438.50. The trade was a 14.53% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. Also, CEO Ryan Mcinerney sold 10,485 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, October 1st. The shares were 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 ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 0.13% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

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.