Stock prices of both Visa and Mastercard have gained roughly 50 per cent in the past year.
Tech
and internet titans were the first to reach $1 trillion in stock
market value, but the next U.S. companies that could do so are
better known for their plastic.
Soaring
stock prices are propelling credit and debit card companies Visa Inc
and Mastercard Inc up the market value charts, where they currently
rank 7th and 11th among companies in the benchmark S&P 500 index.
The stock prices of both Visa and Mastercard have gained roughly 50%
in the past year.
While
the stocks may not keep up that torrid pace, Visa and Mastercard
would each be worth over $1 trillion by 2023 if their average annual
gains of the past three years were to continue, surging past the
likes of Facebook Inc and Berkshire Hathaway Inc, if they also
maintain their recent pace.
Fueling
their rise is a shift toward cashless financial transactions spurred
by a rise in online shopping.
"Everything
travels on their rails," said Sandy Villere, portfolio manager
of the Villere Balanced Fund, which holds Visa shares. "They
literally sit in the middle of the banks, consumers and merchants and
that has been a really enviable place to be."
Visa
had a market value of $449 billion and Mastercard's stood at about
$324 billion as of Thursday's close. The $1 trillion club currently
includes Apple Inc, Microsoft and Google-parent Alphabet.
Amazon.com
stood at $927 billion, though the e-commerce leader's shares jumped
on the heels of its earnings report on Thursday after the bell,
putting it in position to crack $1 trillion, as it did briefly in
September 2018.
Revenue
for both Visa and Mastercard nearly doubled over their past five
fiscal years, to nearly $23 billion for Visa, and about $17 billion
for Mastercard,
according to Refinitiv data. Adjusted earnings per share more than
doubled for both companies over that period.
Visa
reported quarterly revenue late on Thursday that slightly missed
analyst estimates, a day after Mastercard beat quarterly profit
estimates
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