Visa Inc.

We advise investors to diversify their Finance sector holdings with non-bank stocks such as the four we analyze below. All are leaders in their niche fields, which helps cut their risk. Three are also spinoffs from larger firms. That has spurred their share prices....

We still think investors will profit most—and with the least risk—by buying shares of well-established, dividend-paying stocks with strong business prospects.



These are companies that have leading positions in healthy industries. They also have strong management that will make the right moves to remain competitive in a changing market.



Stocks like these give investors an additional measure of safety despite today’s volatility....

VANGUARD GROWTH ETF $106.09 (New York symbol VUG; buy or sell through brokers) aims to track the Center for Research in Security Prices (CRSP) U.S. Large Cap Growth Index. It’s a broadly diversified index that mainly consists of big U.S. companies.

The $50.6 billion fund holds Apple, Alphabet, Facebook, Amazon.com, Coca-Cola, Home Depot, and Walt Disney....

Pennsylvania-based Vanguard Group is one of the world’s largest investment management companies. In all, it administers almost $3 trillion U.S. across 175 mutual funds and ETFs.

Generally speaking, Canadians can’t buy units of mutual funds that are registered in the U.S., because these investments aren’t registered with provincial securities commissions....

VISA INC. $79 (New York symbol V; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Finance sector; Shares outstanding: 2.4 billion; Market cap: $189.6 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 13.3; Dividend yield: 0.7%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.visa.com) operates the world’s largest electronic payments network. It can process over 65,000 credit, debit, prepaid and commercial transactions per second. Visa gets most of its revenue from the fees it charges card issuers and merchants that use its network. These fees are based on transaction volumes and other factors. The banks that issue the credit cards are responsible for evaluating customer creditworthiness and collecting payments, not Visa....

These three companies are a great way to widen your Finance sector exposure beyond banks. They are all leaders in their markets, and trade at reasonable multiples to earnings. Moreover, new investments in their businesses are setting them up for future growth. VISA INC. $79 (New York symbol V; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Finance sector; Shares outstanding: 2.4 billion; Market cap: $189.6 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 13.3; Dividend yield: 0.7%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.visa.com) operates the world’s largest electronic payments network. It can process over 65,000 credit, debit, prepaid and commercial transactions per second....

TD BANK $55.77 (Toronto symbol TD; Shares outstanding: 1.9 billion; Market cap: $103.5 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; Dividend yield: 3.9%; www.td.com) is the first Canadian bank to use Visa’s new tokenization technology in its mobile banking app. This system uses encrypted “tokens” instead of credit card numbers and other account information. That helps protect sensitive client information from online intruders. It also speeds up mobile payments and other transactions. Better security should encourage more of TD’s customers to do their banking online. That would cut its costs as electronic transactions are cheaper to process than those in physical branches....

TD BANK $55.77 (Toronto symbol TD; Shares outstanding: 1.9 billion; Market cap: $103.5 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; Dividend yield: 3.9%; www.td.com) is the first Canadian bank to use Visa’s new tokenization technology in its mobile banking app. This system uses encrypted “tokens” instead of credit card numbers and other account information. That helps protect sensitive client information from online intruders. It also speeds up mobile payments and other transactions. Better security should encourage more of TD’s customers to do their banking online. That would cut its costs as electronic transactions are cheaper to process than those in physical branches....

TORONTO-DOMINION BANK $55 (Toronto symbol TD; Conservative Growth and Income Portfolios, Finance sector; Shares outstanding: 1.9 billion; Market cap: $104.5 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 3.3; Dividend yield: 4.0%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.td.com) is the first Canadian bank to use Visa’s new tokenization technology in its mobile banking app. This system uses encrypted “tokens” instead of credit card numbers and other account information. This helps protect clients’ sensitive information from online intruders. It also speeds up mobile payments and other transactions. Better security should encourage more of TD’s customers to do their banking online. That would cut its costs, as electronic transactions are cheaper to process than those in physical branches....

TORONTO-DOMINION BANK $55 (Toronto symbol TD; Conservative Growth and Income Portfolios, Finance sector; Shares outstanding: 1.9 billion; Market cap: $104.5 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 3.3; Dividend yield: 4.0%; TSINetwork Rating: Above Average; www.td.com) is the first Canadian bank to use Visa’s new tokenization technology in its mobile banking app. This system uses encrypted “tokens” instead of credit card numbers and other account information. This helps protect clients’ sensitive information from online intruders. It also speeds up mobile payments and other transactions. Better security should encourage more of TD’s customers to do their banking online. That would cut its costs, as electronic transactions are cheaper to process than those in physical branches....