Great Lakes Retirement Inc. Boosts Holdings in Visa Inc. (NYSE:V)

Great Lakes Retirement Inc. grew its position in shares of Visa Inc. (NYSE:V) by 5.6% in the fourth quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 41,385 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock after purchasing an additional 2,186 shares during the period. Visa makes up 1.8% of Great Lakes Retirement Inc.’s portfolio, making the stock its 14th biggest holding. Great Lakes Retirement Inc.’s holdings in Visa were worth $10,775,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Hibernia Wealth Partners LLC bought a new stake in Visa during the third quarter valued at approximately $25,000. Altshuler Shaham Ltd purchased a new stake in shares of Visa during the 3rd quarter valued at $25,000. West Tower Group LLC bought a new stake in shares of Visa during the 2nd quarter worth $30,000. Nalls Sherbakoff Group LLC grew its position in Visa by 545.5% in the third quarter. Nalls Sherbakoff Group LLC now owns 142 shares of the credit-card processor’s stock worth $33,000 after acquiring an additional 120 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Valued Wealth Advisors LLC bought a new position in Visa in the fourth quarter valued at $37,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 82.15% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities analysts have recently issued reports on the company. Barclays upped their price objective on Visa from $304.00 to $319.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Monday, January 29th. Royal Bank of Canada increased their price target on shares of Visa from $290.00 to $309.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Friday, January 26th. Wells Fargo & Company boosted their price objective on shares of Visa from $300.00 to $325.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Wednesday, March 6th. BMO Capital Markets assumed coverage on shares of Visa in a report on Tuesday, December 5th. They set an “outperform” rating and a $280.00 target price on the stock. Finally, William Blair reissued an “outperform” rating on shares of Visa in a research note on Friday, January 26th. Five research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and eighteen have issued a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Visa currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $295.82.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Visa news, CAO Peter M. Andreski sold 2,615 shares of Visa stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, February 7th. The shares were sold at an average price of $278.88, for a total value of $729,271.20. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 4,898 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,365,954.24. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. In related news, insider Rajat Taneja sold 36,546 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, January 19th. The stock was sold at an average price of $270.20, for a total transaction of $9,874,729.20. Following the sale, the insider now directly 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 link. Also, CAO Peter M. Andreski sold 2,615 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, February 7th. The shares were sold at an average price of $278.88, for a total transaction of $729,271.20. Following the transaction, the chief accounting officer now owns 4,898 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,365,954.24. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last three months, insiders have sold 47,311 shares of company stock valued at $12,832,129. 0.19% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Visa Trading Up 0.3 %

NYSE:V traded up $0.70 during trading hours on Thursday, hitting $279.72. The company had a trading volume of 2,714,541 shares, compared to its average volume of 5,597,521. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.54, a current ratio of 1.45 and a quick ratio of 1.45. Visa Inc. has a 52 week low of $216.14 and a 52 week high of $290.96. The company has a market capitalization of $513.71 billion, a PE ratio of 32.09, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.94 and a beta of 0.96. The stock has a 50-day moving average price of $278.86 and a 200 day moving average price of $258.51.

Visa (NYSE:V) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, January 25th. The credit-card processor reported $2.41 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating 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 company had revenue of $8.63 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $8.55 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company earned $2.18 earnings per share. Visa’s quarterly revenue was up 9.3% on a year-over-year basis. On average, equities research analysts predict that Visa Inc. will post 9.89 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Visa Announces Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, March 1st. Stockholders of record on Friday, February 9th were issued a dividend of $0.52 per share. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, February 8th. This represents a $2.08 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.74%. Visa’s payout ratio is 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.