2 Credit Card Stocks Hitting 52-Week Highs

NEW YORK (TheStreet) - Shares of these two credit card companies hit 52-week highs on Wednesday: Visa(V) and Discover Financial(DFS).

Both of these stocks get buy ratings from TheStreet Ratings.

Visa

Visa reported fiscal first-quarter earnings of $1.03 billion, or $1.49 a share, last week, beating Wall Street's estimate for a profit of $1.45 a share.

Of Visa's report, Morgan Keegan analysts wrote in a Feb. 9 report that: "Higher pricing offset modestly lower volumes; A higher tax rate prevented a bigger beat of Street expectations."

Shares of Visa hit a 52-week high of $117.18 on Wednesday. The stock's 52-week low of $26.50 was set on March 2.

Visa's stock trades at a forward price-to-earnings ratio of 16.6X; the average for consumer finance companies is 10.6X. For comparison, American Express(AXP) and Mastercard(MA) both have lower forward P/Es of 11.1X and 15.4X respectively.

Of the 40 analysts who cover Visa, 32 rate the stock at buy and eight are at hold.

TheStreet Ratings gives Visa and A grade with a buy rating and has a $137.51 price target on the shares. The stock has risen 13.56% year to date.