Western Digital (NASDAQ:WDC) Trading Down 1.9% – Should You Sell?

Western Digital Corporation (NASDAQ:WDC)’s share price traded down 1.9% during mid-day trading on Monday . The stock traded as low as $444.52 and last traded at $450.55. 5,830,716 shares traded hands during trading, a decline of 33% from the average session volume of 8,767,666 shares. The stock had previously closed at $459.45.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities analysts have commented on the stock. Bank of America upped their price objective on shares of Western Digital from $610.00 to $732.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, July 1st. Weiss Ratings cut shares of Western Digital from a “buy (b)” rating to a “buy (b-)” rating in a research note on Tuesday, August 11th. TD Cowen lifted their target price on shares of Western Digital from $500.00 to $540.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, August 6th. Melius Research set a $1,050.00 price target on shares of Western Digital and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday, June 29th. Finally, Wall Street Zen cut shares of Western Digital from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Sunday, August 16th. Two analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, eighteen have issued a Buy rating and five have assigned a Hold rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Western Digital presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $534.56.

Western Digital Stock Performance

The stock has a market cap of $155.30 billion, a P/E ratio of 18.61 and a beta of 2.14. The stock’s fifty day simple moving average is $526.99 and its 200-day simple moving average is $440.71.

Western Digital (NASDAQ:WDC) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, August 5th. The data storage provider reported $3.56 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.31 by $0.25. Western Digital had a return on equity of 48.15% and a net margin of 72.95%.The firm had revenue of $3.75 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $3.70 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $1.66 EPS. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 43.8% compared to the same quarter last year. Western Digital has set its Q1 2027 guidance at 3.850-4.150 EPS. As a group, equities research analysts forecast that Western Digital Corporation will post 19.65 earnings per share for the current year.

Western Digital Announces Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, September 17th. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, September 8th will be paid a $0.15 dividend. This represents a $0.60 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.1%. The ex-dividend date is Tuesday, September 8th. Western Digital’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 2.48%.

Insider Activity at Western Digital

In other news, insider Cynthia L. Tregillis sold 1,007 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, August 27th. The shares were sold at an average price of $478.36, for a total transaction of $481,708.52. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider owned 112,155 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $53,650,465.80. This trade represents a 0.89% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, CEO Irving Tan sold 20,000 shares of Western Digital stock in a transaction on Tuesday, August 11th. The stock was sold at an average price of $444.97, for a total transaction of $8,899,400.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer owned 575,966 shares in the company, valued at approximately $256,287,591.02. This trade represents a 3.36% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Over the last 90 days, insiders sold 23,642 shares of company stock valued at $10,676,659. Corporate insiders own 0.18% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Western Digital

Several large investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the business. Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC bought a new position in shares of Western Digital during the 2nd quarter worth approximately $28,000. Dunhill Financial LLC acquired a new position in shares of Western Digital during the second quarter valued at about $29,000. Stonehage Fleming Financial Services Holdings Ltd bought a new stake in shares of Western Digital during the second quarter worth about $31,000. Gables Capital Management Inc. acquired a new stake in shares of Western Digital in the 2nd quarter worth about $32,000. Finally, Ares Financial Consulting LLC raised its holdings in shares of Western Digital by 45.5% in the 2nd quarter. Ares Financial Consulting LLC now owns 80 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $51,000 after acquiring an additional 25 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds 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.