954 Shares in Western Digital Corporation $WDC Bought by Balefire LLC

Balefire LLC bought a new position in Western Digital Corporation (NASDAQ:WDC) during the first quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the SEC. The firm bought 954 shares of the data storage provider’s stock, valued at approximately $258,000.

Several other hedge funds have also added to or reduced their stakes in the business. China Universal Asset Management Co. Ltd. bought a new stake in Western Digital in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $2,270,000. WESPAC Advisors LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Western Digital during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $793,000. NorthCrest Asset Manangement LLC grew its holdings in shares of Western Digital by 75.4% in the fourth quarter. NorthCrest Asset Manangement LLC now owns 9,465 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $1,778,000 after purchasing an additional 4,068 shares during the last quarter. Nomura Asset Management Co. Ltd. grew its holdings in shares of Western Digital by 33.6% in the fourth quarter. Nomura Asset Management Co. Ltd. now owns 1,122,095 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $193,303,000 after purchasing an additional 282,156 shares during the last quarter. Finally, CloudAlpha Capital Management Limited Hong Kong purchased a new position in shares of Western Digital in the fourth quarter worth $20,889,000. 92.51% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities research analysts recently commented on WDC shares. Rosenblatt Securities upped their price target on shares of Western Digital from $340.00 to $500.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, May 1st. Jefferies Financial Group set a $575.00 price target on shares of Western Digital in a report on Tuesday, May 26th. TD Cowen boosted their price objective on shares of Western Digital from $325.00 to $500.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, May 1st. 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 research note on Wednesday, July 1st. Finally, Melius Research set a $1,050.00 target price on shares of Western Digital and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Monday, June 29th. Two research 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, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $520.32.

Western Digital Stock Up 12.5%

Shares of Western Digital stock opened at $548.39 on Wednesday. The business has a 50 day moving average of $561.52 and a 200 day moving average of $390.88. Western Digital Corporation has a 52 week low of $66.04 and a 52 week high of $799.87. The company has a market cap of $189.02 billion, a PE ratio of 32.74 and a beta of 2.11.

Western Digital (NASDAQ:WDC) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, April 30th. The data storage provider reported $2.72 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.39 by $0.33. The business had revenue of $3.34 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations 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% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business posted $1.36 earnings per share. Western Digital has set its Q4 2026 guidance at 3.100-3.400 EPS. On average, research analysts anticipate that Western Digital Corporation will post 9.61 earnings per share for the current year.

Western Digital Increases Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, June 17th. Stockholders of record on Friday, June 5th were given a $0.15 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, June 5th. This represents a $0.60 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.1%. This is a positive change from Western Digital’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.12. Western Digital’s dividend payout ratio is 3.58%.

Key Western Digital News

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

• Positive Sentiment: Western Digital is benefiting from a sector-wide rebound in semiconductors, with investors buying back into memory stocks after a steep pullback. Why Is Western Digital Stock Surging on Tuesday?
• Positive Sentiment: Reports that AI is driving stronger memory and storage demand are supporting the bull case for Western Digital, with analysts expecting a continued recovery in pricing and earnings power. NVIDIA Isn’t Leading AI Stocks in 2026 – These 2 Are Up Over 180%
• Positive Sentiment: Several market summaries say Western Digital is part of a broad AI trade rebound, alongside Micron and SanDisk, as investors look ahead to major tech earnings and a potential memory upgrade cycle. Chip Stocks Surge but Software Sector Feels the Pain Again
• Neutral Sentiment: Western Digital has also been mentioned in commentary about a possible 2027 hardware refresh cycle tied to AI memory growth, which could help long-term demand but is still more of a future thesis than a near-term catalyst. AAPL, HPQ, SNDK, WDC: Gene Munster Says ‘Memory Hog’ AI Will Trigger a Massive 2027 Upgrade Cycle

Insider Activity at Western Digital

In related news, Director Bruce E. Kiddoo sold 750 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, May 28th. The shares were sold at an average price of $528.52, for a total transaction of $396,390.00. Following the transaction, the director owned 3,903 shares in the company, valued at $2,062,813.56. The trade was a 16.12% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, insider Vidyadhara K. Gubbi sold 2,475 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Monday, June 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $556.24, for a total transaction of $1,376,694.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider directly owned 85,154 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $47,366,060.96. The trade was a 2.82% decrease in their ownership of the stock. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. Over the last quarter, insiders sold 28,959 shares of company stock worth $12,631,666. 0.18% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

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.