Shift to online payments will lift these two

Article Excerpt

Both Visa and American Express stand to gain from the ongoing shift to online shopping and payments. Moreover, the COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated that shift and should partially offset the current slowdown in credit card spending. Still, in the short-term, the earnings of both companies will likely remain down until the economy picks up. VISA INC. $199 is a buy. The stock (New York symbol V; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Finance sector; Shares outstanding: 2.2 billion; Market cap: $437.8 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 18.3; Divd. yield: 0.6%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.visa.com) gives you exposure to the world’s largest electronic-payments network. It processes credit, debit, prepaid and commercial transactions in over 200 countries. For the quarter ended June 30, 2020, Visa processed 40.7 billion transactions. That’s down 12.0% from a year earlier due to store closures and international travel restrictions. Revenue in the quarter also fell 17.2%, to $4.84 billion from $5.84 billion a year earlier. If you disregard unusual items, Visa’s overall earnings dropped 24.3%, to $2.35…