When Bill Ackman’s Pershing Square Capital Management puts capital to work, Wall Street pays attention.
The billionaire investor’s firm just disclosed a brand new stake in one of the biggest names in payments. And the size of the bet is hard to ignore.
Regulatory filings show Pershing Square initiated multiple positions in companies across the financial segment. Let’s dive deeper.
Bill Ackman goes big on Visa stock
Pershing Square’s latest 13F filing, covering holdings as of June 29, 2026, shows a fresh position in Visa Inc.
The fund now owns 3.27 million shares of Visa (V) worth roughly $1.12 billion, accounting for 5.4% of the hedge fund’s portfolio.
It places Visa stock among Pershing Square’s larger holdings, just behind names like Uber, Brookfield Corp, Microsoft, and Amazon in overall portfolio weight.
Visa wasn’t the only new addition.
The same filing shows Pershing Square also opened a position in Mastercard, buying 2.12 million shares worth about $1.09 billion, or 5.26% of the portfolio.
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The fund also started a position in S&P Global, a company that plays a major role in credit ratings and financial data, worth roughly $1.06 billion.
All three positions show up as completely new in the filing.
Ackman built exposure across the broader financial infrastructure space in the same quarter, putting more than $3 billion combined into Visa, Mastercard, and S&P Global.
For a fund known for concentrated, high-conviction bets, opening three related positions at once suggests a deliberate view on where payments and financial data businesses are headed.
Visa’s business is firing on all cylinders
The timing lines up with a strong stretch for Visa.
In the company’s fiscal third-quarter 2026 earnings call on July 28, CEO Ryan McInerney said net revenue rose 14% year over year to $11.6 billion, with earnings per share up 11%, both ahead of expectations.
Quarterly payments volume grew 10% year over year in constant dollars to cross $4 trillion for the first time in company history, while processed transactions grew 10% to $72 billion.
Chief Financial Officer Chris Suh pointed to strength across the board.
- U.S. payment volume grew 10% year over year, a pace not seen since 2019 outside of the pandemic recovery bounce.
- Cross-border volume, excluding transactions within Europe, grew 12%.
- The company bought back $4.9 billion in stock during the quarter and paid out $1.3 billion in dividends.
Visa diversifies its revenue base
Visa’s value-added services segment, which includes fraud prevention, data analytics and consulting, grew revenue 34% in constant dollars during the quarter, Suh said.
That segment now makes up close to a third of Visa’s total revenue.
Speaking at the Bernstein 42nd Annual Strategic Decisions Conference in May, McInerney said these businesses have consistently grown more than 20% year over year for several years running.
Ackman’s investment also lines up with Visa’s push into new technology.
Related: Visa hands banks an edge against their rivals with AI tool
On the July earnings call, McInerney detailed a partnership with OpenAI to support secure payments within AI-driven, or agentic, commerce, along with a similar arrangement with Meta covering Facebook and Instagram.
McInerney told the Bernstein audience in May that he sees agentic commerce as a major growth driver ahead, comparing it to earlier shifts toward online and mobile shopping.
He argued that Visa credentials, backed by fraud protection and dispute resolution, are better suited for an AI-driven shopping world than newer alternatives like stablecoins.
Visa is also building out its stablecoin infrastructure, launching the Visa Stablecoin Platform this quarter and joining a new venture called Open Standard, which plans to issue a dollar-backed stablecoin called Open USD.
“Technology and commerce are evolving faster than ever,” McInerney stated during the earnings call. “As the leading hyperscaler of payments globally, Visa is at the center of this transformation, bringing trust to whatever form commerce takes next.”
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Is Visa stock undervalued right now?
For a hedge fund built on long-term, high-conviction ideas, opening three related positions in payments and financial data companies in a single quarter sends a clear signal.
Pershing Square appears to be betting that the infrastructure behind digital payments, backed by resilient consumer spending and new AI-driven commerce, still has plenty of room to run.
Given consensus estimates compiled by Tikr.com:
- Analysts forecast Visa to increase revenue from $40 billion in fiscal 2025 to $67.6 billion in fiscal 2030.
- In this period, free cash flow is projected to expand from $21.6 billion to $39 billion.
- If Visa stock trades at 20x forward FCF, below its five-year average of 24.6x, it could return 15% over the next three years.
I assumed a lower FCF multiple because Visa is projected to grow FCF at a compound annual growth rate of 12.5% over the next five years, below the 17.5% growth rate over the last five years.
Out of the 28 analysts covering Visa stock, 26 recommend “Buy,” and two recommend “Hold.” The average Visa stock price target is $422, above the current price of $371.
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