Western Digital (NASDAQ:WDC) Rating Lowered to “Hold” at Wall Street Zen

Western Digital (NASDAQ:WDC) was downgraded by equities researchers at Wall Street Zen from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report released on Saturday.

Other analysts also recently issued reports about the company. Evercore reissued an “outperform” rating and issued a $230.00 price objective on shares of Western Digital in a research note on Friday, January 16th. Barclays increased their price target on Western Digital from $240.00 to $325.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Friday, January 30th. Morgan Stanley lifted their price objective on shares of Western Digital from $260.00 to $306.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Friday, January 30th. New Street Research set a $250.00 target price on shares of Western Digital in a report on Tuesday, February 3rd. Finally, Wedbush reissued an “outperform” rating and set a $325.00 price target on shares of Western Digital in a research report on Monday, February 9th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty have given a Buy rating and three have issued a Hold rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $265.58.

Western Digital Stock Performance

NASDAQ WDC opened at $285.52 on Friday. The company has a market capitalization of $96.80 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 28.64, a PEG ratio of 0.66 and a beta of 1.79. The company has a quick ratio of 1.19, a current ratio of 1.46 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.34. Western Digital has a twelve month low of $28.83 and a twelve month high of $309.90. The stock has a fifty day simple moving average of $227.88 and a 200 day simple moving average of $159.58.

Western Digital (NASDAQ:WDC) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, January 29th. The data storage provider reported $2.13 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.93 by $0.20. The company had revenue of $3.02 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.93 billion. Western Digital had a net margin of 35.52% and a return on equity of 41.53%. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 25.2% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted $1.77 EPS. Sell-side analysts expect that Western Digital will post 4.89 EPS for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling

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 shares were sold at an average price of $255.44, for a total value of $5,108,800.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer directly owned 623,586 shares in the company, valued at approximately $159,288,807.84. The trade was a 3.11% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, Director Roxanne Oulman sold 1,800 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, November 25th. The shares were sold at an average price of $154.42, for a total value of $277,956.00. Following the transaction, the director directly owned 3,863 shares in the company, valued at $596,524.46. This trade represents a 31.79% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. Insiders have sold a total of 70,522 shares of company stock worth $17,661,708 over the last ninety days. Corporate insiders own 0.18% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the company. WCM Investment Management LLC purchased a new position in Western Digital during the third quarter valued at approximately $791,317,000. Norges Bank purchased a new stake in shares of Western Digital in the fourth quarter worth $788,729,000. Fred Alger Management LLC raised its position in shares of Western Digital by 4,923.9% during the 3rd quarter. Fred Alger Management LLC now owns 3,407,042 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $409,049,000 after purchasing an additional 3,339,225 shares during the period. Soroban Capital Partners LP lifted its stake in shares of Western Digital by 1,926.3% during the 2nd quarter. Soroban Capital Partners LP now owns 3,061,134 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $195,882,000 after buying an additional 2,910,062 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Polar Capital Holdings Plc bought a new position in Western Digital in the 3rd quarter worth $221,800,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 92.51% of the company’s stock.

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.