Western Digital (NASDAQ:WDC) Trading Up 6.4% After Analyst Upgrade

Shares of Western Digital Corporation (NASDAQ:WDC) shot up 6.4% during mid-day trading on Friday after JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised their price target on the stock from $530.00 to $650.00. JPMorgan Chase & Co. currently has an overweight rating on the stock. Western Digital traded as high as $572.29 and last traded at $562.93. 6,082,589 shares traded hands during trading, a decline of 31% from the average session volume of 8,760,891 shares. The stock had previously closed at $529.29.

WDC has been the topic of a number of other research reports. The Goldman Sachs Group reiterated a “neutral” rating and set a $400.00 price target on shares of Western Digital in a research report on Friday, May 1st. Barclays raised their target price on Western Digital from $450.00 to $620.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, May 27th. Jefferies Financial Group set a $575.00 target price on Western Digital in a research report on Tuesday, May 26th. TD Cowen raised their target price on Western Digital from $325.00 to $500.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, May 1st. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company raised their target price on Western Digital from $500.00 to $575.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Monday, June 1st. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, eighteen have given a Buy rating and three have given a Hold rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $443.71.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, CEO Irving Tan sold 20,000 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, May 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $411.84, for a total value of $8,236,800.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer owned 598,150 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $246,342,096. This trade represents a 3.24% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, insider Cynthia L. Tregillis sold 432 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, June 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $545.60, for a total value of $235,699.20. Following the completion of the sale, the insider directly owned 116,643 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $63,640,420.80. This represents a 0.37% decrease in their position. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Insiders sold a total of 29,322 shares of company stock worth $12,768,550 in the last three months. Company insiders own 0.18% of the company’s stock.

Key Stories Impacting Western Digital

Here are the key news stories impacting Western Digital this week:

• Positive Sentiment: JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised its price target on Western Digital from $530 to $650 and kept an Overweight rating, signaling more upside from current levels. Benzinga
• Positive Sentiment: The stock is benefiting from a broader AI storage rally, with traders bidding up memory and disk-drive names on expectations that data-center demand will keep growing. 24/7 Wall St.
• Positive Sentiment: Western Digital also drew attention for a share exchange plan involving SanDisk shares, which helped spark buying interest and reinforced the market’s focus on its storage assets. Blockonomi
• Positive Sentiment: Recent coverage highlighted Western Digital’s strong free cash flow, higher dividend, and $4 billion buyback plan, which supports the bull case for shareholder returns and long-term growth. Zacks
• Positive Sentiment: The company’s AI-focused storage products showcased at Computex add to optimism that WDC can capture more of the growing AI infrastructure spend. Zacks
• Neutral Sentiment: Western Digital also announced enterprise hard drive upgrades aimed at improving resistance to quantum attacks, a longer-term product/security update with limited immediate stock impact. heise online

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Western Digital

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Valley Wealth Managers Inc. acquired a new stake in shares of Western Digital in the first quarter valued at approximately $32,000. IMG Wealth Management Inc. increased its stake in Western Digital by 853.8% during the first quarter. IMG Wealth Management Inc. now owns 124 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $34,000 after acquiring an additional 111 shares during the last quarter. Catalyst Capital Advisors LLC acquired a new stake in Western Digital during the first quarter worth $35,000. Cornerstone Planning Group LLC increased its stake in Western Digital by 33.3% during the first quarter. Cornerstone Planning Group LLC now owns 132 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $36,000 after acquiring an additional 33 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Annis Gardner Whiting Capital Advisors LLC increased its stake in Western Digital by 80.2% during the first quarter. Annis Gardner Whiting Capital Advisors LLC now owns 146 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $39,000 after acquiring an additional 65 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 92.51% of the company’s stock.

Western Digital Price Performance

The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $441.92 and a 200-day simple moving average of $306.11. The company has a market cap of $194.03 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 33.61 and a beta of 2.13.

Western Digital (NASDAQ:WDC) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, April 30th. The data storage provider reported $2.72 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.39 by $0.33. The company had revenue of $3.34 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $3.25 billion. Western Digital had a return on equity of 42.95% and a net margin of 55.29%.The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 45.5% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the firm earned $1.36 earnings per share. Western Digital has set its Q4 2026 guidance at 3.100-3.400 EPS. Research analysts anticipate that Western Digital Corporation will post 9.57 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Western Digital Increases Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, June 17th. Shareholders of record on Friday, June 5th will be paid a dividend of $0.15 per share. This represents a $0.60 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.1%. This is a positive change from Western Digital’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.13. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, June 5th. Western Digital’s payout ratio is 3.58%.

Western Digital Company Profile

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.