Being one of the leading credit card stocks around, Mastercard (NYSE:MA) is usually a sound investment. Though when spending drops off and customers stop pulling out the plastic to charge large parts of their lives, the times are not so happy. A little extra love from analysts, meanwhile, wasn’t enough to reverse a fractional loss for Mastercard shares in Thursday afternoon’s trading.
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The word out of Seaport Global, via analyst Jeff Cantwell, is that Mastercard is actually in a better position than its chief rival, Visa (NYSE:V). Cantwell acknowledged that macro conditions right now are souring for credit card companies, and while that’s the case, Mastercard is actually losing less ground than Visa is. Indeed, Cantwell noted that Mastercard has landed “…several new wins that will convert and be additive.” In perhaps the biggest surprise, Cantwell looks for Mastercard’s earnings-per-share (EPS) figures to rise by the “mid-to-high teens” level for the next two years.
Is Mastercard a Buy, Sell, or Hold?
Turning to Wall Street, analysts have a Strong Buy consensus rating on MA stock based on 20 Buys and one Hold assigned in the past three months, as indicated by the graphic below. Furthermore, the average MA price target of $465 per share implies 16.33% upside potential.
