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

Western Digital Corporation (NASDAQ:WDC) shares gapped down prior to trading on Friday . The stock had previously closed at $558.30, but opened at $538.50. Western Digital shares last traded at $524.56, with a volume of 1,217,635 shares trading hands.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

WDC has been the subject of a number of recent analyst reports. Zacks Research raised shares of Western Digital from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, May 6th. Mizuho increased their price objective on shares of Western Digital from $550.00 to $685.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Monday, June 8th. Susquehanna raised their price objective on shares of Western Digital from $360.00 to $500.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Wednesday, July 8th. Jefferies Financial Group set a $575.00 target price on Western Digital in a research report on Tuesday, May 26th. Finally, Citigroup upped their target price on Western Digital from $685.00 to $800.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday, July 13th. Two analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, eighteen have issued a Buy rating and four have assigned a Hold rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Western Digital presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $520.32.

Western Digital Trading Down 5.1%

The company has a market cap of $182.67 billion, a PE ratio of 31.54 and a beta of 2.11. The company’s 50 day moving average is $564.15 and its 200 day moving average is $396.20.

Western Digital (NASDAQ:WDC) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, April 30th. The data storage provider reported $2.72 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.39 by $0.33. The company had revenue of $3.34 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $3.25 billion. Western Digital had a net margin of 55.29% and a return on equity of 42.95%. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 45.5% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the business posted $1.36 EPS. Western Digital has set its Q4 2026 guidance at 3.100-3.400 EPS. Analysts expect that Western Digital Corporation will post 9.61 EPS for the current year.

Western Digital Increases Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, June 17th. Investors of record on Friday, June 5th were issued a $0.15 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Friday, June 5th. This is a positive change from Western Digital’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.12. This represents a $0.60 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.1%. Western Digital’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 3.58%.

Insider Transactions at Western Digital

In other Western Digital news, CEO Irving Tan sold 20,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Friday, May 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $411.84, for a total transaction of $8,236,800.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer directly owned 598,150 shares in the company, valued at $246,342,096. This trade represents a 3.24% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, insider Cynthia L. Tregillis sold 432 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Friday, June 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $545.60, for a total value of $235,699.20. Following the transaction, the insider owned 116,643 shares in the company, valued at $63,640,420.80. The trade was a 0.37% decrease in their ownership of the stock. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Insiders sold 28,959 shares of company stock worth $12,631,666 in the last ninety days. 0.18% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the business. China Universal Asset Management Co. Ltd. bought a new stake in Western Digital during the fourth quarter valued at about $2,270,000. WESPAC Advisors LLC bought a new position in Western Digital in the fourth quarter worth about $793,000. Nomura Asset Management Co. Ltd. lifted its position in shares of Western Digital by 33.6% during the fourth quarter. Nomura Asset Management Co. Ltd. now owns 1,122,095 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $193,303,000 after buying an additional 282,156 shares during the last quarter. CloudAlpha Capital Management Limited Hong Kong purchased a new stake in shares of Western Digital during the fourth quarter valued at about $20,889,000. Finally, World Investment Advisors boosted its holdings in shares of Western Digital by 145.8% in the 4th quarter. World Investment Advisors now owns 5,950 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $1,025,000 after buying an additional 3,529 shares in the last quarter. 92.51% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

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.