Visa Inc. is an international payment processing network, best known for its credit, debit and prepaid cards. There are 3.6 billion Visa credit and debit cards in the hands of consumers worldwide. The company processed $2.35 trillion of payments in 2020, making it the largest payment processing network globally. Visa stock is publicly listed on the New York Stock Exchange, meaning the public can buy shares to earn dividends and potentially profit from rising share prices.

This article explains how you can buy Visa stock and informs you of important details you should know before investing in Visa. You should understand the company’s history, past performance, current business model, future plans, potential risks, analyst predictions, dividend schedule and earning potential.

Visa Overview

Based on the latest information, here is a quick look at some important facts and statistics concerning Visa Inc.

Visa was founded in 1958, originally called BankAmericard.
The company has 20,500 employees worldwide.
Visa is traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol V.
The Visa payment network can process up to 100 billion computations every second and up to 30,000 transactions concurrently.
Visa is a constituent of the Dow Jones Industrial Average and the S&P 500 index.
There are 3.592 billion Visa cards connected to 3.192 billion accounts.
In Q1 2021, Visa processed 54.878 billion transactions worth over $3 trillion.

Visa Initial Public Offering

Visa’s initial public offering took place on Wednesday the 19th of March 2008. The company listed on the New York Stock Exchange with the ticker symbol V. The company’s shares were sold at $44 each, raising $17.9 billion. Before the IPO, analysts predicted a price range of $37 to $42. Visa stock closed at $56.50 on the first trading day.

Visa Stock Price History

The Visa shares were floated on the NYSE in 2008 for $44 dollars each. When adjusted for splits and dividends, that makes the IPO price equal to $14.13. If the cumulative dividends since the IPO are factored into the equation, that means the net cost of buying Visa shares at the IPO would have been $1.98. Comparing Visa to the S&P 500 and the Dow Jones Industrial Average, Visa outperforms them both by over 1,000%.

Visa Stock Dividend Information

Fewer and fewer companies are paying shareholders dividends, especially in the technology sector. However, Visa continues to pay dividends, and the dividend payout has been growing steadily over time.

The most recent Visa dividend payout was $0.32 on the 13th of August 2021. Based on the day’s closing price of $231.79, that makes the Visa dividend yield 0.55% for the full year. Ever since the company was listed on the NYSE, it has paid out a total of $12.15 per share to shareholders.

Visa Stock Splits

Visa has performed two stock splits in its history. The first Visa stock split occurred on the 11th of December 2000. It was a reverse split at a rate of 1-for-5, meaning if you had 10 Visa shares before the split, you’d have 2 shares after. The purpose of doing a reverse split is to increase the price per share by reducing the number of shares while the market cap remains the same.

On the 18th of March 2015, Visa performed a 4-for-1 stock split, meaning that if you had 2 Visa shares before the split, you’d get 8 more, giving you a total of 10. The stock split dilutes the number of outstanding shares, causing the stock price to decrease, offset by having additional shares.

Recent Visa Stock Forecast and Prediction

Visa currently has a strong buy consensus from professional Wall Street analysts. The analyst predictions indicate modest room for growth.

JP Morgan analyst Tien Tsin Huang maintained a buy rating on Visa stock and also raised his Visa price target from $249 to $267.
Bank of America Securities analyst Jason Kupferberg maintained the company’s buy rating on Visa stock and raised the price target from $264 to $279.
Citi analyst Ashwin Shirvaikar maintained a buy rating on Visa stock and raised the company’s price target from $283 to $288.
Wells Fargo analyst Donald Fandetti maintained a buy rating on Visa stock and raised the company’s price target from $265 to $280.
Goldman Sachs analyst Matthew O’Neill maintained a buy rating on Visa stock and raised the company’s price target $262 to $264.

Should I Buy Visa stock? Points to Consider

Are you trying to decide whether you should invest in Visa or perhaps speculate on the price with a long or short position? Before making your move, you should consider the company’s fundamentals, price history, dividend earning, price history and dividend earnings.

Visa business model

Visa is an international payment network operating card schemes that enable banks, credit institutions and electronic money institutions to issue debit, credit and prepaid cards to customers. The company does not issue cards; they are the technology provider that processes transaction information between merchants, acquiring banks and issuing banks.

Visa makes money by charging interchange fees to banks. An interchange fee is essentially a percentage of the transaction value, plus a fixed fee per transaction. The amount charged depends on various factors. These include the type of card (credit, debit or prepaid), whether the card was present or not, what type of authentication used, where the issuing bank and acquiring bank are located, and other variables. Visa also charges for licensing, providing technology and customer support services.

Visa is the largest card payment network and shadows China UnionPay and Mastercard. China UnionPay is a state-owned enterprise with a monopoly on the Chinese market. In 2020, Visa processed 40% of all card purchases. China UnionPay processed 32% and Mastercard 24%.

Visa competitors

Before investing in a company, you should be familiar with its competitors, who may limit growth or steal market share. Visa is the largest card payment network in the world. The company has profited substantially from easy credit, the growth of e-commerce & online payments, the adoption of mobile point of sale terminals and the general phasing out of cash.

Visa’s biggest competitors are Mastercard (NYSE:MA), American Express (NYSE:AXP), UnionPay as well as JCB. The latter two are not publicly listed companies.

However, the latest threat to Visa is e-wallets and fintech companies like PayPal, Klarna and Affirm that offer online payment acquisition, point of sale payments using mobile apps and QR codes and buy-now-pay-later solutions.

Where Can I Buy Visa Stock?

One of the best ways to invest in Visa shares is to create a stock trading account with international broker ZFX.

ZFX – Trade Visa with an award-winning platform

If you want to speculate on the stock price of Visa with day trading strategies, you can trade Visa on the ZFX MetaTrader 4 platform, used by millions of traders and thousands of brokers worldwide.

ZFX is an international forex and CFD broker. There are several distinct differences between trading CFDs on stocks and investing in shares.

With CFDs, you can use leverage to decrease capital requirements. Whereas when you buy shares, you must cover the entire order value with your cash. ZFX offers 1:5 leverage, meaning you only need to provide a 20% margin to trade Visa shares.
With CFDs, you can go long or short, allowing you to speculate on the price rising or falling and hedging your Visa positions.
With CFDs, you can trade more frequently because of lower transaction costs. CFDs don’t incur exchange, clearinghouse and custodian fees or taxes. With ZFX, you can scalp or day trade Visa shares without worrying about commissions adding up.

How to Buy Visa Stock Now

Visa shares are traded on the New York Stock Exchange. Unfortunately, only professional firms can cooperate directly with the exchange. Therefore, you need to work with a broker. If you’re considering trading Visa shares today, follow this simple checklist:

The first step to trading Visa shares is opening a brokerage account with ZFX.

Trade Walmart - Step 1

Choose between either a live or demo trading account. Demo accounts are great for practising your trading capabilities and getting familiar with the platform features and settings. To open a live account, you’ll need your proof of identity and a proof of residence to perform online identity verification.

trade Walmart shares with ZFX - Step 4

Fund your trading account via bank transfer, e-wallet or your Visa or Mastercard. Make Deposit - Visa stock

Once you’re inside the MetaTrader 4 platform, you’ll see a list of trading instruments on the left-hand side of the interface. Scroll down the list until you find Visa and click to open the chart.

In order to open a new order, right-click on the chart and select ‘new order’ from the context menu. In the new order window, you can enter your order configuration, such as the number of shares you want to trade, plus any special order properties in case you want to use a limit or stop order. When you’re all done, simply click ‘confirm’.

Investing in Visa Stock – Final Thoughts

There is an overwhelming buy consensus for Visa stocks among Wall Street analysts. However, their price targets aren’t overly ambitious. Indeed, most analysts only expect the Visa stock price to grow several per cent over the next twelve months, meaning there could be better opportunities out there.

Visa dominates the card payment sector, and thus there is little room for growth. This is why it is important to look at other niches Visa is moving towards. Based on current acquisition plans of companies like Tink and CurrencyCloud, it seems Visa is trying to become an infrastructure provider for competing fintech providers.

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