Visa Inc. (V)

Drifting sideways between $325-375 since beginning of this year. Range-bound, not clear if it wants to go up or down. Consumer spending has been resilient, but he's keeping an eye on it. What happens with consumer spending is critical to this name.

To succeed, you have to do the underlying, to sell it at your level, or else you will buy it back at a higher price. A Canadian writing a covered call on a US stock that income treatment is a capital gain, which is good.

Still attractive. Continues to average up into the position. Despite inflation, still gets to participate in the growth of commerce.

Is up only 8% this year, but always buy this on weakness.

Great business, growing secularly. Dominant position in a tight oligopoly. Domestic (40%) and overseas (60%). Expects earnings to continue to compound at ~12-14% pace over coming several years. Competitive moat means not likely to be disrupted. 

Has pulled back about 8%, while equity market is making new highs. One to buy the dip. At ~27x PE, trades at small discount to MA right now. MA is growing faster, around 15%. But trades at 32-33x PE. 

He'd be fine with buying either one or both for the very long term.

It is a great company and the key benefit lies in the transition from cash to credit. They are adding more add-on services but it has under-performed the S&P 500 for the past few years. It is stable but not accelerating so there are probably better opportunities elsewhere.

He owns Mastercard but they both offer low risk and attractive returns. Visa and MC are a duopoly. Long term, Visa has done better than lately but it shows growing its top line by 10 to 12%. 

Though he's not a fundamental analyst, he can offer a small insight into the credit industry. There's been a lot of talk that's there's probably going to be some reason for the Fed to ease, and that's because the economy is probably slowing down. Purchases will be down, so Visa and the like will suffer.

That's probably why it's stopped moving up to the same degree as the S&P 500. Looking at the chart, you can see the consolidation pattern; as long as the pattern doesn't break, you're OK. Don't assume anything. If it breaks to the upside, you want to be a longer-term owner. But it could also break to the downside, possibly for the fundamental reason mentioned above. So you need to be cautious on this one. The consolidation could be a warning sign.

Has grown its dividend 23% annually for the last 15 years. Rising prices means that Visa will take a larger portion in charges. Visa is the #1 in most markets over Mastercard (also excellent), and is larger. 

She still sees upside and it is one of the best known players in global payments. It has double digit revenue growth and its value added services contribute to more than a quarter of its revenue. Still has high margins. Returned $6 billion to shareholders in buybacks and dividends last year. Has strong fundamentals.

Financials are a good idea now, especially fintech. He prefers Visa to Mastercard, because it trades a little cheaper. Is a consistent, high earnings company.

Global leader, few competitors. Stock's come down to 200-day MA, which is always a good time to dip back in (and he did). He's held this name since 2016, adding when down and trimming when frothy. Revenue for 2026 expected to exceed $44B. Really consistent, very steady growth. Around 13-15% compounded earnings growth ahead. Yield is 0.71%.

The world of business is just fine. Great company, will do well longer term. Fears of stablecoin. Short-term issues will get sorted out. 

He owns MA.

Recent struggles are probably due to stablecoin, which is tied to the US dollar. If it can manifest into an efficient system (very low, or zero, transaction fees), could be a threat to V's business. Visa also has the ability to change its fees or to set up its own stablecoin. He's not too concerned, it's really just noise. This is his favourite.

Down 8% off 52-week high, which is normal trading that can happen to any stock at any time. Down 3% this week. As good a time as any to buy.

A good name to look at for credit services in the financial sector.