Ninety One UK Ltd Grows Stock Position in Mastercard Incorporated $MA

Ninety One UK Ltd increased its stake in shares of Mastercard Incorporated (NYSE:MA) by 2.9% in the 3rd quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 1,211,514 shares of the credit services provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 34,053 shares during the quarter. Mastercard accounts for 1.5% of Ninety One UK Ltd’s holdings, making the stock its 18th largest holding. Ninety One UK Ltd’s holdings in Mastercard were worth $689,121,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

A number of other hedge funds also recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Brighton Jones LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Mastercard by 42.3% in the 4th quarter. Brighton Jones LLC now owns 6,824 shares of the credit services provider’s stock valued at $3,594,000 after buying an additional 2,028 shares in the last quarter. EP Wealth Advisors LLC increased its stake in Mastercard by 1.5% in the 1st quarter. EP Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 19,575 shares of the credit services provider’s stock valued at $10,729,000 after buying an additional 285 shares during the period. 1 North Wealth Services LLC purchased a new position in Mastercard during the 1st quarter worth $44,000. Aprio Wealth Management LLC lifted its position in Mastercard by 22.9% in the first quarter. Aprio Wealth Management LLC now owns 3,627 shares of the credit services provider’s stock valued at $1,988,000 after purchasing an additional 675 shares during the period. Finally, Advisors Asset Management Inc. grew its holdings in Mastercard by 1.7% during the first quarter. Advisors Asset Management Inc. now owns 123,332 shares of the credit services provider’s stock worth $67,601,000 after acquiring an additional 2,013 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 97.28% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

MA has been the topic of several recent research reports. Cowen reiterated a “buy” rating on shares of Mastercard in a research report on Friday, October 31st. Evercore ISI set a $610.00 target price on shares of Mastercard in a research report on Friday, December 12th. The Goldman Sachs Group reaffirmed a “buy” rating and set a $713.00 price target on shares of Mastercard in a research report on Thursday, October 30th. Macquarie boosted their target price on shares of Mastercard from $655.00 to $660.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Friday, October 31st. Finally, Citigroup upgraded Mastercard to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Thursday, October 23rd. Five investment analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-one have assigned a Buy rating and three have given a Hold rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company presently has an average rating of “Buy” and an average price target of $657.48.

Mastercard Trading Down 1.1%

Shares of Mastercard stock opened at $570.96 on Thursday. The business has a fifty day simple moving average of $555.96 and a 200-day simple moving average of $565.57. Mastercard Incorporated has a fifty-two week low of $465.59 and a fifty-two week high of $601.77. The firm has a market cap of $512.72 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 36.51, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.27 and a beta of 0.87. The company has a quick ratio of 1.12, a current ratio of 1.12 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 2.40.

Mastercard (NYSE:MA) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, October 30th. The credit services provider reported $4.38 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $4.31 by $0.07. Mastercard had a net margin of 45.28% and a return on equity of 202.03%. The firm had revenue of $8.60 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $8.53 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the business earned $3.89 earnings per share. Mastercard’s revenue for the quarter was up 16.7% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, equities analysts forecast that Mastercard Incorporated will post 15.91 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Mastercard Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, February 9th. Stockholders of record on Friday, January 9th will be given a $0.87 dividend. This represents a $3.48 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.6%. This is an increase from Mastercard’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.76. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, January 9th. Mastercard’s payout ratio is 19.44%.

Mastercard Profile

Mastercard Incorporated is a global payments technology company that operates a network connecting consumers, financial institutions, merchants, governments and businesses in more than 200 countries and territories. The company facilitates electronic payments and transaction processing for credit, debit and prepaid card products carrying the Mastercard brand, while also providing a range of payment-related services to issuers, acquirers and merchants. Its technology and network enable authorization, clearing and settlement of payments and support a broad set of use cases including point-of-sale, e-commerce and mobile payments.

Beyond core transaction processing, Mastercard offers a suite of value-added services such as fraud and risk management, identity and authentication tools, tokenization and digital wallet support, cross-border and commercial payment solutions, and data analytics and consulting services for merchants and financial partners.