One-glance verdict
Within fair range
$450.33 our estimate vs market $375.07
Wall Street consensus: $419.36 (-6.9% lower than our fair-value estimate)
17% below our estimate
Fundamentals snapshot
Visa Inc.
V · NYQ · Financial Services · Credit Services
Current price
$375.07
52-week range
$293.89 - $385.57
Market cap
$700.27B
Balance sheet
Healthy
45.09x Strong cushion
Net debt $10.07B. Interest coverage shows how many times profit covers the interest bill.
What stands out
3 Rewards
3 Risks
3 rewards · 3 risks
- Reward Revenue grew 7.6% last year.
- Reward Returns 61.2% on equity, ahead of 50% of its peers.
- Risk Net debt grew 57.2% over 3 years.
- Risk Stock trades 11.2% above its 5-year average P/E.
What this company does
Visa Inc.
Visa operates the massive global network that processes payments when you use a credit or debit card with their logo. The company doesn't actually lend you money; instead, it earns a small fee on each purchase by acting as the secure middleman between your bank and the merchant's bank. This means Visa's business grows as more people and businesses around the world choose to pay with cards instead of cash.
How the company got here
Visa's story began in 1958 when Bank of America launched the first general-purpose credit card, called BankAmericard, in Fresno, California. Before this, people had multiple different credit accounts with various merchants, which was inefficient. To expand, the bank licensed the card system to other banks, and in 1976, the collection of banks renamed the unified network "Visa" because it sounds the same in many languages. A key turning point was its initial public offering (IPO, the first time a private company sells its shares to the public) in 2008, which was one of the largest in U.S. history.
What it actually does
Visa doesn't issue credit cards, lend money, or set the interest rates you pay; your bank does that. Instead, Visa operates a massive electronic payments network that makes it possible for your card to work. Think of it like a highway for money: when you tap your card to buy a coffee, Visa's network carries the transaction information from the coffee shop's bank to your bank for approval in seconds. The company provides the technology and infrastructure that allows consumers, businesses, and governments to move money electronically in over 200 countries.
Service Revenues
This is a major part of Visa's business, where it earns fees based on the total dollar amount of purchases made with Visa-branded cards. For every dollar you spend, Visa charges the card-issuing bank a small percentage. This part of the business is considered a good hedge against inflation (a general increase in prices and fall in the purchasing value of money), because as the price of goods and services goes up, the fees Visa collects also increase automatically. These fees are for the use of the Visa brand and payment services.
Data Processing Revenues
This is Visa's largest source of income, earned by charging fees for each transaction that crosses its network. Whether you buy a pack of gum or a new car, Visa charges a small fee to authorize, clear, and settle the payment. It's not about the dollar amount of the purchase, but the number of times the network is used. With billions of transactions happening, these small, per-transaction fees add up to a significant portion of the company's total revenue.
International Transaction Revenues
Visa makes money when you use your card in a foreign country or buy something online from an international merchant. These cross-border transactions are more complex, often involving converting currencies, so Visa charges additional fees for them. This is a significant business line, making up more than a third of the company's revenue. The more people travel and shop globally, the more this segment grows.
Other Revenues (including Value-Added Services)
This is a smaller but fast-growing part of Visa's business that goes beyond basic payment processing. It includes a wide range of services that Visa sells to banks and merchants, such as fraud prevention tools, data analytics, and consulting services. For example, Visa offers services that help merchants resolve payment disputes or use a secure "token" instead of your actual card number for online shopping to improve security. These services provide extra value and create another stream of income for the company.
What management is betting on now
Visa is heavily investing in expanding its Value-Added Services, which it sees as a major opportunity for future growth beyond traditional card payments. The company is also focusing on new ways to move money, such as business-to-business payments and enabling real-time money transfers between individuals through services like Visa Direct. Additionally, Visa is aggressively integrating artificial intelligence (AI) to improve efficiency, enhance security, and develop new services, seeing AI as a key driver for the future of commerce.
Price history
How the share price has moved
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Earnings history
Last 8 quarters — what happened
Click any quarter to read the call summary and what the numbers say.
FY2024 Q3
$4.73B
FY2024 Q4
$6.36B
FY2025 Q1
$5.05B
FY2025 Q2
$4.37B
FY2025 Q3
$6.31B
FY2025 Q4
$5.85B
FY2026 Q1
$6.40B
FY2026 Q2
$2.62B
Revenue
$11.23B
Net income
$6.02B
Diluted EPS
—
Operating cash flow
$3.01B
Free cash flow
$2.62B
Fetching…
Sources
Revenue
$10.90B
Net income
$5.85B
Diluted EPS
—
Operating cash flow
$6.78B
Free cash flow
$6.40B
Fetching…
Sources
Revenue
$10.72B
Net income
$5.09B
Diluted EPS
—
Operating cash flow
$6.24B
Free cash flow
$5.85B
Fetching…
Sources
Revenue
$10.17B
Net income
$5.27B
Diluted EPS
—
Operating cash flow
$6.73B
Free cash flow
$6.31B
Fetching…
Sources
Revenue
$9.59B
Net income
$4.58B
Diluted EPS
—
Operating cash flow
$4.70B
Free cash flow
$4.37B
Fetching…
Sources
Revenue
$9.51B
Net income
$5.12B
Diluted EPS
—
Operating cash flow
$5.40B
Free cash flow
$5.05B
Fetching…
Sources
Revenue
$9.62B
Net income
$5.32B
Diluted EPS
—
Operating cash flow
$6.66B
Free cash flow
$6.36B
Fetching…
Sources
Revenue
$8.90B
Net income
$4.87B
Diluted EPS
—
Operating cash flow
$5.13B
Free cash flow
$4.73B
Fetching…
Sources
Is it cheap or expensive?
Fair value $450.33 vs current price $375.07
Wall Street consensus is the average analyst price target: $419.36 (-6.9% lower than our fair-value estimate).
Our most-likely fair value is $450.33 a share — about 20.1% away from today's price of $375.07, so the stock currently looks fairly priced.
Is it drowning in debt?
Healthy
Net debt $10.1B. Interest coverage 45.1x.
Net debt
$10.07B
Interest coverage
45.09x
Visa Inc.'s profit covers its interest bill about 45.1 times over. which is stronger than every peer shown here.
Healthy
Worse cushion
Baseline
Better cushion
V
BASELINE
Visa Inc.
Total debt $23.86B Interest coverage 45.09x This is the baseline the peer rows are being compared against.
Total debt $24.64B Interest coverage 27.03x -40% vs V Carries about 1.7x less debt cushion than V.
Total debt $14.22B Interest coverage 14.50x -68% vs V Carries about 3.1x less debt cushion than V.
What you should know
The case for and against V
3 Rewards
3 Risks
Rewards
-
Revenue grew 7.6% last year.
-
Returns 61.2% on equity, ahead of 50% of its peers.
-
Free cash flow was positive in 10/10 years.
Risks
-
Net debt grew 57.2% over 3 years.
-
Stock trades 11.2% above its 5-year average P/E.
-
Operating margin compressed from 67.1% to 66.1% over 3 years.
The numbers
All the key metrics, grouped by purpose
Tap any ? icon to learn what it means.
Valuation
How expensive the stock looks
P/E (TTM)
31.95x
Forward P/E
25.00x
P/B
19.88x
P/S
15.74x
EV/EBITDA
22.51x
PEG ratio
1.70x
Profitability
How much profit each dollar creates
Gross margin
97.7%
Operating margin
66.1%
Net margin
50.8%
ROE
61.2%
ROA
19.1%
Health
Liquidity and balance-sheet strength
Debt / equity
0.68x
Current ratio
0.98x
Quick ratio
0.63x
Total debt
$23.86B
Total cash
$13.79B
Growth
How the business has been compounding
Revenue TTM
$43.03B
Revenue 5Y CAGR
13.5%
EPS TTM
11.74
EPS 5Y CAGR
13.4%
Cash flow
How much cash the business throws off
Operating CF TTM
$22.76B
Free CF TTM
$21.58B
FCF margin
50.1%
Dividend
Shareholder payout
Yield
0.7%
Payout ratio
22.1%
Last ex-div date
2026-08-11