Western Digital (NASDAQ:WDC) Shares Down 1.6% – Time to Sell?

Shares of Western Digital Corporation (NASDAQ:WDC) traded down 1.6% during trading on Wednesday . The stock traded as low as $280.75 and last traded at $296.14. 7,608,481 shares were traded during trading, a decline of 24% from the average session volume of 10,063,836 shares. The stock had previously closed at $301.05.

Key Headlines Impacting Western Digital

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

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of analysts have recently weighed in on the stock. Susquehanna restated a “neutral” rating and issued a $285.00 target price on shares of Western Digital in a report on Friday, February 6th. Wall Street Zen downgraded shares of Western Digital from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Saturday, February 21st. Wedbush reiterated an “outperform” rating and issued a $325.00 price target on shares of Western Digital in a research report on Monday, February 9th. Morgan Stanley boosted their price objective on Western Digital from $260.00 to $306.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Friday, January 30th. Finally, Robert W. Baird set a $310.00 price objective on Western Digital in a research report on Monday, February 2nd. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty have given a Buy rating and three have given a Hold rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Western Digital currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $265.58.

Western Digital Trading Up 0.7%

The firm has a market cap of $93.35 billion, a PE ratio of 27.62, a P/E/G ratio of 0.68 and a beta of 1.76. The company has a quick ratio of 1.19, a current ratio of 1.46 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.34. The company’s 50 day moving average price is $271.67 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $191.82.

Western Digital (NASDAQ:WDC) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, January 29th. The data storage provider reported $2.13 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.93 by $0.20. The firm had revenue of $3.02 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $2.93 billion. Western Digital had a net margin of 35.52% and a return on equity of 41.53%. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 25.2% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the company earned $1.77 EPS. As a group, sell-side analysts forecast that Western Digital Corporation will post 4.89 EPS for the current year.

Western Digital Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, March 18th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, March 5th were paid a $0.125 dividend. 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 dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 5.02%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, insider Vidyadhara K. Gubbi sold 10,148 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, March 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $270.31, for a total transaction of $2,743,105.88. Following the completion of the sale, the insider directly owned 107,794 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $29,137,796.14. This trade represents a 8.60% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, Director Matthew E. Massengill sold 36,926 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, February 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $260.43, for a total value of $9,616,638.18. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. Insiders have sold 92,795 shares of company stock worth $24,265,884 over the last three months. 0.18% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Trading of Western Digital

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of WDC. Alps Advisors Inc. boosted its stake in shares of Western Digital by 0.8% during the fourth quarter. Alps Advisors Inc. now owns 4,707 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $811,000 after purchasing an additional 37 shares during the period. Quadcap Wealth Management LLC increased its stake in Western Digital by 2.1% in the 4th quarter. Quadcap Wealth Management LLC now owns 2,007 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $346,000 after buying an additional 41 shares during the period. Moss Adams Wealth Advisors LLC increased its stake in Western Digital by 2.6% in the 4th quarter. Moss Adams Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 1,982 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $341,000 after buying an additional 51 shares during the period. Bogart Wealth LLC lifted its holdings in Western Digital by 19.4% during the 4th quarter. Bogart Wealth LLC now owns 369 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $64,000 after buying an additional 60 shares in the last quarter. Finally, CYBER HORNET ETFs LLC boosted its position in Western Digital by 7.2% in the 4th quarter. CYBER HORNET ETFs LLC now owns 889 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $153,000 after buying an additional 60 shares during the period. 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.