Shares of Western Digital Corporation (NASDAQ:WDC – Get Free Report) have been assigned a consensus recommendation of “Moderate Buy” from the twenty-four brokerages that are presently covering the company, MarketBeat reports. Three analysts have rated the stock with a hold recommendation, twenty have issued a buy recommendation and one has assigned a strong buy recommendation to the company. The average 12 month price objective among analysts that have updated their coverage on the stock in the last year is $265.5833.
WDC has been the topic of several research reports. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price target on Western Digital from $260.00 to $335.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Friday, January 30th. The Goldman Sachs Group set a $250.00 price objective on Western Digital in a report on Tuesday, February 3rd. Argus set a $300.00 price objective on Western Digital in a research report on Tuesday, February 3rd. Wedbush restated an “outperform” rating and set a $325.00 target price on shares of Western Digital in a report on Monday, February 9th. Finally, TD Cowen upped their target price on shares of Western Digital from $200.00 to $325.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, January 30th.
Get Our Latest Stock Report on WDC
Western Digital Price Performance
Western Digital (NASDAQ:WDC – Get Free Report) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, January 29th. The data storage provider reported $2.13 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.93 by $0.20. Western Digital had a return on equity of 41.53% and a net margin of 35.52%.The business had revenue of $3.02 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $2.93 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $1.77 EPS. The business’s revenue was up 25.2% on a year-over-year basis. On average, sell-side analysts forecast that Western Digital will post 4.89 EPS for the current year.
Western Digital Announces Dividend
The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, March 18th. Investors of record on Thursday, March 5th were paid a dividend of $0.125 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, March 5th. This represents a $0.50 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.2%. Western Digital’s payout ratio is presently 5.02%.
More Western Digital News
Here are the key news stories impacting Western Digital this week:
- Positive Sentiment: Cloud growth and margin upside highlighted as a key thesis for WDC’s next leg of revenue and margin expansion. Western Digital: Cloud Key Driver To Growth And Margins
- Positive Sentiment: Technical market action: a recent trading signal coincided with a rebound in WDC shares, supporting near-term momentum. Western Digital Shares Rebound, Climb 3% After Key Trading Signal
- Positive Sentiment: Analyst comparisons favor WDC over peers like NetApp on AI-driven storage demand and cash returns, reinforcing buy-case narratives. Western Digital vs. NetApp: Which Data Storage Stock is the Better Buy?
- Positive Sentiment: WD is part of an open-source quantum error correction collaboration (OQD + QuScript), signaling R&D breadth that may support longer-term enterprise opportunities. OQD Launches Open-Source Collaboration with WD and QuScript to Advance Quantum Error Correction
- Neutral Sentiment: Retail promotions and deep discounts on WD-branded SSDs/HDDs (Amazon/Best Buy sales) could boost volume but also reflect aggressive consumer pricing. Upgrade your NAS storage with this WD 2TB SSD – now $240 off during Amazon’s Spring Sale
- Negative Sentiment: Google’s new TurboQuant algorithm has raised investor concerns that AI models could require materially less memory, potentially reducing hardware demand long-term. Google Just Unveiled TurboQuant: Should You Sell Sandisk Stock Now?
- Negative Sentiment: Sector reaction and a Micron selloff reflect investor skepticism about how sustainable AI-driven memory demand will be if efficiency improvements proliferate. Micron Drop Raises A Bigger AI Question
- Negative Sentiment: Broader market and interest-rate concerns are pressuring computer and memory stocks generally, tempering upside for WDC despite company-level positives. SNDK, WDC and STX Forecasts – Computer Companies Fall with Everything Else
Insider Buying and Selling at Western Digital
In other news, CEO Irving Tan sold 20,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, February 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $255.44, for a total value of $5,108,800.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer directly owned 623,586 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $159,288,807.84. The trade was a 3.11% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. Also, insider Cynthia L. Tregillis sold 9,324 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, March 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $268.27, for a total value of $2,501,349.48. Following the completion of the sale, the insider directly owned 121,682 shares in the company, valued at approximately $32,643,630.14. This represents a 7.12% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. Insiders have sold a total of 92,795 shares of company stock worth $24,265,884 in the last ninety days. 0.18% of the stock is owned by company insiders.
Institutional Inflows and Outflows
Large investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Avion Wealth grew its stake in shares of Western Digital by 163.8% in the fourth quarter. Avion Wealth now owns 182 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $31,000 after acquiring an additional 113 shares during the last quarter. Swiss RE Ltd. bought a new position in shares of Western Digital during the fourth quarter valued at $32,000. ORG Partners LLC raised its position in shares of Western Digital by 124.5% in the 3rd quarter. ORG Partners LLC now owns 211 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $25,000 after purchasing an additional 117 shares during the last quarter. Concord Wealth Partners bought a new position in Western Digital in the 4th quarter worth about $41,000. Finally, Cullen Frost Bankers Inc. boosted its stake in Western Digital by 551.4% in the 3rd quarter. Cullen Frost Bankers Inc. now owns 241 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $29,000 after purchasing an additional 204 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 92.51% of the company’s stock.
About Western Digital
Western Digital Corporation is a global data storage company that designs, manufactures and sells a broad range of storage devices and systems for personal, enterprise and cloud applications. Headquartered in San Jose, California, the company develops hard disk drives (HDDs), solid-state drives (SSDs), NAND flash components and finished storage products used in PCs, external storage, servers, network-attached storage (NAS) and embedded systems.
Its product portfolio spans consumer and commercial markets, including internal and external HDDs and SSDs, removable flash memory products and storage platforms for data center and enterprise environments.
Further Reading
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