Western Digital Corporation (NASDAQ:WDC) Given Consensus Recommendation of “Moderate Buy” by Analysts

Western Digital Corporation (NASDAQ:WDC) has been assigned a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” from the twenty-five ratings firms that are currently covering the stock, MarketBeat Ratings reports. Five research analysts have rated the stock with a hold recommendation, nineteen have issued a buy recommendation and one has assigned a strong buy recommendation to the company. The average 12-month target price among brokers that have issued a report on the stock in the last year is $173.65.

Several brokerages have commented on WDC. The Goldman Sachs Group reiterated a “neutral” rating and set a $148.00 target price on shares of Western Digital in a research note on Friday, October 31st. UBS Group increased their price objective on Western Digital from $135.00 to $145.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, October 31st. Benchmark boosted their target price on Western Digital from $115.00 to $163.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, October 31st. Zacks Research upgraded shares of Western Digital from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Monday, October 13th. Finally, Weiss Ratings reiterated a “hold (c+)” rating on shares of Western Digital in a research note on Monday, December 15th.

Insider Activity at Western Digital

In other news, Director Kimberly Alexy sold 1,768 shares of the stock in a transaction on Tuesday, November 25th. The stock was sold at an average price of $154.00, for a total transaction of $272,272.00. Following the transaction, the director directly owned 3,585 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $552,090. This represents a 33.03% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. Also, Director Roxanne Oulman sold 1,800 shares of Western Digital stock in a transaction on Tuesday, November 25th. The stock was sold at an average price of $154.42, for a total value of $277,956.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director directly owned 3,863 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $596,524.46. The trade was a 31.79% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. Insiders have sold a total of 26,369 shares of company stock valued at $4,013,785 in the last quarter. 0.18% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Western Digital

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in WDC. SYM FINANCIAL Corp bought a new stake in Western Digital during the 2nd quarter valued at $225,000. Nordea Investment Management AB grew its position in shares of Western Digital by 9.6% during the 2nd quarter. Nordea Investment Management AB now owns 30,434 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $1,938,000 after buying an additional 2,656 shares in the last quarter. Parsifal Capital Management LP increased its stake in shares of Western Digital by 32.0% during the first quarter. Parsifal Capital Management LP now owns 897,574 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $36,289,000 after buying an additional 217,574 shares during the period. Greenleaf Trust bought a new stake in shares of Western Digital in the second quarter valued at about $233,000. Finally, Resona Asset Management Co. Ltd. raised its holdings in shares of Western Digital by 7.1% in the second quarter. Resona Asset Management Co. Ltd. now owns 118,888 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $7,594,000 after acquiring an additional 7,913 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 92.51% of the company’s stock.

Western Digital Stock Performance

Shares of WDC stock opened at $176.76 on Thursday. The company has a market capitalization of $60.43 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 25.73, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.12 and a beta of 1.82. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.42, a quick ratio of 0.94 and a current ratio of 1.21. Western Digital has a one year low of $28.83 and a one year high of $188.77. The company’s 50-day moving average is $153.63 and its 200 day moving average is $106.87.

Western Digital (NASDAQ:WDC) last issued its earnings results on Monday, April 7th. The data storage provider reported $1.78 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter. The firm had revenue of $4.10 billion for the quarter. Western Digital had a net margin of 21.37% and a return on equity of 30.89%. Sell-side analysts expect that Western Digital will post 4.89 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Western Digital Increases Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, December 18th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, December 4th were given a $0.125 dividend. This is a boost from Western Digital’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.10. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, December 4th. This represents a $0.50 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.3%. Western Digital’s payout ratio is presently 7.28%.

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.