Western Digital (NASDAQ:WDC) Upgraded at Sanford C. Bernstein

Sanford C. Bernstein upgraded shares of Western Digital (NASDAQ:WDC) from a market perform rating to an outperform rating in a research report sent to investors on Tuesday morning, MarketBeat Ratings reports. They currently have $340.00 target price on the data storage provider’s stock.

Several other analysts also recently commented on the stock. Bank of America boosted their target price on shares of Western Digital from $197.00 to $257.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, January 20th. Citigroup raised their price target on shares of Western Digital to $325.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Monday, February 2nd. Truist Financial set a $310.00 price objective on shares of Western Digital in a research note on Tuesday, February 3rd. Robert W. Baird set a $310.00 price objective on shares of Western Digital in a report on Monday, February 2nd. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company increased their target price on shares of Western Digital from $260.00 to $335.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Friday, January 30th. Twenty-one analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and three have assigned a Hold rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $275.75.

Western Digital Stock Down 0.9%

WDC opened at $294.97 on Tuesday. The company has a market capitalization of $100.01 billion, a PE ratio of 29.59, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.69 and a beta of 1.77. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.34, a current ratio of 1.46 and a quick ratio of 1.19. Western Digital has a fifty-two week low of $28.83 and a fifty-two week high of $319.62. The business has a 50-day moving average of $276.45 and a 200-day moving average of $198.17.

Western Digital (NASDAQ:WDC) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, January 29th. The data storage provider reported $2.13 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.93 by $0.20. The business had revenue of $3.02 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $2.93 billion. Western Digital had a return on equity of 41.53% and a net margin of 35.52%.The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 25.2% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business posted $1.77 EPS. Equities research analysts forecast that Western Digital will post 4.89 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Western Digital Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, March 18th. Investors of record on Thursday, March 5th were paid a $0.125 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, March 5th. This represents a $0.50 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.2%. Western Digital’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 5.02%.

Insider Activity

In other Western Digital news, CEO Irving Tan sold 20,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, February 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $255.44, for a total transaction 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 $159,288,807.84. This represents a 3.11% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Also, Director Matthew E. Massengill sold 36,926 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, February 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $260.43, for a total value of $9,616,638.18. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. Over the last quarter, insiders have sold 92,795 shares of company stock worth $24,265,884. Insiders own 0.18% of the company’s stock.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Western Digital

Large investors have recently made changes to their positions in the business. ORG Partners LLC grew its holdings in Western Digital by 124.5% in the 3rd quarter. ORG Partners LLC now owns 211 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $25,000 after buying an additional 117 shares during the last quarter. Rakuten Securities Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Western Digital by 4,070.0% during the second quarter. Rakuten Securities Inc. now owns 417 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $27,000 after buying an additional 407 shares during the last quarter. Cullen Frost Bankers Inc. boosted its position in shares of Western Digital by 551.4% in the third quarter. Cullen Frost Bankers Inc. now owns 241 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $29,000 after acquiring an additional 204 shares during the period. Grove Bank & Trust bought a new stake in shares of Western Digital in the third quarter valued at approximately $30,000. Finally, Westfuller Advisors LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Western Digital in the third quarter worth $30,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 92.51% of the company’s stock.

Key Headlines Impacting Western Digital

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

• Positive Sentiment: Bernstein upgraded WDC to Outperform, prompting a sizable intraday rally as investors viewed the pullback as a buying opportunity. Western Digital (NASDAQ:WDC) Raised to “Outperform” at Sanford C. Bernstein
• Positive Sentiment: Other coverage and momentum flows pushed WDC up ~10–11% on Wednesday as traders positioned ahead of earnings, signaling short-term investor optimism. Western Digital (WDC) Jumps 10% Ahead of Earnings
• Positive Sentiment: Industry analysis highlights WDC’s strong positioning in AI/cloud nearline HDDs — reports note high UltraSMR adoption, long-term hyperscaler commitments and sell-outs into 2026–2028, supporting revenue and margin outlooks. There’s A Storage Problem With AI Inference – And Western Digital Knows It
• Positive Sentiment: Real-world demand: a government agency archive deployment using WD Ultrastar drives underscores enterprise/customer wins for high-density storage. JetStor Delivers 80PB High-Density Archive for Government Agency Using WD’s Trusted High-Capacity Ultrastar Drives
• Neutral Sentiment: New product/consumer pricing noise: a promotional sale on a 5TB WD portable drive drew headlines — relevant for consumer demand/ASP monitoring but not a major driver for enterprise HDD momentum. WD 5TB Portable External Hard Drive for Mac Drops to $0.03 per GB Even After Amazon’s Spring Sale
• Neutral Sentiment: ETF product news: Roundhill launched a Memory ETF (DRAM) — increases thematic flow options into memory/storage names, which could help bid the group but is not a direct WDC catalyst. Roundhill Investments Launches First-Ever Memory ETF (DRAM)
• Negative Sentiment: Macro headwinds: broader market weakness (inflation and rate worries) pressured futures and tech names today, contributing to WDC’s pullback. US Stock Market Today S&P 500 Futures Fall As Inflation And Rate Worries Persist
• Negative Sentiment: Analyst downgrade: Zacks cut WDC from “strong-buy” to “hold,” adding selling pressure after recent gains. Zacks Research Downgrade
• Negative Sentiment: Intraday pullback & volatility: coverage tracking WDC notes a ~3% intraday pullback as traders take profits following the recent spike. What’s Going On With Western Digital Stock Thursday?

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.