Western Digital Corporation $WDC Shares Sold by Brookstone Capital Management

Brookstone Capital Management cut its holdings in shares of Western Digital Corporation (NASDAQ:WDC) by 98.0% in the 4th quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 2,304 shares of the data storage provider’s stock after selling 110,785 shares during the period. Brookstone Capital Management’s holdings in Western Digital were worth $397,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other hedge funds have also bought and sold shares of the company. Mirae Asset Global Investments Co. Ltd. grew its stake in Western Digital by 12.3% in the third quarter. Mirae Asset Global Investments Co. Ltd. now owns 52,317 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $6,281,000 after purchasing an additional 5,731 shares in the last quarter. LBP AM SA acquired a new position in Western Digital in the third quarter worth about $641,000. AustralianSuper Pty Ltd acquired a new position in Western Digital in the third quarter worth about $34,244,000. NorthCrest Asset Manangement LLC grew its stake in 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 in the last quarter. Finally, Moloney Securities Asset Management LLC acquired a new position in Western Digital in the third quarter worth about $636,000. 92.51% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities analysts recently commented on the company. New Street Research set a $250.00 price target on Western Digital in a research note on Tuesday, February 3rd. Mizuho raised their target price on shares of Western Digital to $340.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, February 4th. Robert W. Baird set a $310.00 target price on shares of Western Digital in a report on Monday, February 2nd. Argus set a $300.00 target price on shares of Western Digital in a report on Tuesday, February 3rd. Finally, Rosenblatt Securities reissued a “buy” rating and issued a $340.00 target price on shares of Western Digital in a report on Wednesday, February 4th. Twenty-one analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and three have assigned a Hold rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $278.83.

Western Digital Stock Performance

Shares of NASDAQ WDC opened at $304.15 on Tuesday. 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 firm’s 50-day moving average price is $278.89 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $202.28. Western Digital Corporation has a 52-week low of $28.83 and a 52-week high of $319.62. The stock has a market capitalization of $103.12 billion, a P/E ratio of 30.51, a P/E/G ratio of 0.68 and a beta of 1.77.

Western Digital (NASDAQ:WDC) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, January 29th. The data storage provider reported $2.13 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.93 by $0.20. The firm had revenue of $3.02 billion for 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%. Western Digital’s revenue was up 25.2% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the company posted $1.77 earnings per share. As a group, sell-side analysts forecast that Western Digital Corporation will post 4.89 earnings per share for the current year.

Western Digital Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, March 18th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, March 5th were issued a dividend of $0.125 per share. This represents a $0.50 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.2%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, March 5th. Western Digital’s payout ratio is 5.02%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, CEO Irving Tan sold 20,000 shares of Western Digital stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, February 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $255.44, for a total transaction of $5,108,800.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer owned 623,586 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $159,288,807.84. The trade was a 3.11% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, Director Matthew E. Massengill sold 36,926 shares of Western Digital stock in a transaction that occurred on 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. In the last three months, insiders sold 92,795 shares of company stock worth $24,265,884. 0.18% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Western Digital 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.