Pinnacle Associates Ltd. Takes Position in Western Digital Corporation $WDC

Pinnacle Associates Ltd. bought a new stake in Western Digital Corporation (NASDAQ:WDC) in the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The institutional investor bought 3,025 shares of the data storage provider’s stock, valued at approximately $521,000.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Rakuten Securities Inc. increased its stake in shares of Western Digital by 4,070.0% in the 2nd quarter. Rakuten Securities Inc. now owns 417 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $27,000 after purchasing an additional 407 shares during the last quarter. Cullen Frost Bankers Inc. increased its stake in shares of Western Digital by 551.4% in the 3rd quarter. Cullen Frost Bankers Inc. now owns 241 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $29,000 after purchasing an additional 204 shares during the last quarter. Westfuller Advisors LLC bought a new position in shares of Western Digital in the 3rd quarter valued at $30,000. Avion Wealth increased its stake in shares of Western Digital by 163.8% in the 4th quarter. Avion Wealth now owns 182 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $31,000 after purchasing an additional 113 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Cornerstone Planning Group LLC increased its stake in shares of Western Digital by 207.0% in the 3rd quarter. Cornerstone Planning Group LLC now owns 264 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $32,000 after purchasing an additional 178 shares during the last quarter. 92.51% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Trending Headlines about Western Digital

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

• Positive Sentiment: Western Digital unveiled post-quantum cryptography-enabled Ultrastar UltraSMR hard drives, highlighting its push into next-generation, AI-era infrastructure security and potentially expanding enterprise demand. WD Advances Next-Generation Trusted Infrastructure with Industry’s First Post-Quantum Cryptography Hard Drives to Help Secure the Future of AI Data
• Positive Sentiment: Reports about AI storage demand suggest Western Digital and Seagate are benefiting from tighter supply and better pricing power in mass-capacity drives, which is supportive for revenue and margins. Seagate and Western Digital: AI Storage Demand Is Now Showing Up in Pricing Power
• Positive Sentiment: Broader coverage of the AI memory/storage boom is drawing investor attention to Western Digital as one of the names positioned to benefit from infrastructure spending. Memory Chip Stocks to Watch: Micron (MU), SK Hynix, and Western Digital Lead AI Boom
• Neutral Sentiment: Analyst sentiment remains constructive, with Western Digital receiving a “Moderate Buy” consensus rating, but this is a supportive backdrop rather than a fresh catalyst. Western Digital Corporation (NASDAQ:WDC) Receives Consensus Recommendation of “Moderate Buy” from Analysts
• Neutral Sentiment: Other articles on Micron and SanDisk largely reinforce the same industry theme: AI demand is improving the outlook for memory and storage suppliers, but they do not appear to be direct company-specific catalysts for Western Digital. Why Did Micron Stock Drop Today? Why Did Sandisk Stock Drop Today?

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Western Digital news, CEO Irving Tan sold 20,000 shares of Western Digital stock in a transaction dated 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 of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $246,342,096. The trade was a 3.24% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, insider Cynthia L. Tregillis sold 363 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, April 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $377.09, for a total value of $136,883.67. Following the completion of the sale, the insider owned 120,023 shares in the company, valued at $45,259,473.07. This trade represents a 0.30% decrease in their position. 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 have sold a total of 53,679 shares of company stock worth $18,049,314 in the last ninety days. Company insiders own 0.18% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

WDC has been the topic of several recent analyst reports. Mizuho set a $470.00 price target on Western Digital in a research note on Friday, May 1st. Evercore reissued an “outperform” rating and set a $500.00 target price on shares of Western Digital in a research note on Friday, May 1st. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted their target price on Western Digital from $320.00 to $400.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, April 16th. Citigroup boosted their target price on Western Digital from $405.00 to $500.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, May 1st. Finally, TD Cowen boosted their target price on Western Digital from $325.00 to $500.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, May 1st. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, eighteen have issued a Buy rating and three have issued a Hold rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $395.83.

Western Digital Stock Down 4.8%

Shares of WDC opened at $458.68 on Tuesday. Western Digital Corporation has a 12-month low of $49.00 and a 12-month high of $525.15. The business has a 50-day simple moving average of $356.14 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $260.04. The stock has a market cap of $158.10 billion, a PE ratio of 27.38 and a beta of 2.10.

Western Digital (NASDAQ:WDC) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, April 30th. The data storage provider reported $2.72 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.39 by $0.33. Western Digital had a return on equity of 42.95% and a net margin of 55.29%.The business had revenue of $3.34 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $3.25 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm earned $1.36 EPS. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 45.5% compared to the same quarter last year. Western Digital has set its Q4 2026 guidance at 3.100-3.400 EPS. On average, equities research analysts expect that Western Digital Corporation will post 9.57 EPS for the current year.

Western Digital Increases Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, June 17th. Investors of record on Friday, June 5th will be given a dividend of $0.15 per share. The ex-dividend date is Friday, June 5th. This represents a $0.60 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.1%. This is a boost from Western Digital’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.13. Western Digital’s dividend payout ratio is 2.99%.

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.