Western Digital (NASDAQ:WDC) Given New $410.00 Price Target at Evercore

Western Digital (NASDAQ:WDC) had its price target increased by investment analysts at Evercore from $378.00 to $410.00 in a research report issued on Monday. The brokerage currently has an “outperform” rating on the data storage provider’s stock. Evercore’s target price points to a potential upside of 11.54% from the stock’s previous close.

A number of other research firms have also commented on WDC. Citigroup lifted their target price on Western Digital to $405.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Monday, April 13th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted their target price on Western Digital to $400.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Thursday. Wells Fargo & Company raised their price target on shares of Western Digital from $260.00 to $335.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Friday, January 30th. TD Cowen lifted their price target on shares of Western Digital from $200.00 to $325.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, January 30th. Finally, Zacks Research downgraded shares of Western Digital from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Tuesday, March 31st. Twenty-one analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and three have assigned a Hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, Western Digital currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $305.63.

Western Digital Stock Down 1.3%

WDC stock traded down $4.95 during trading on Monday, hitting $367.57. 675,658 shares of the stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 9,407,511. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.34, a current ratio of 1.46 and a quick ratio of 1.19. The stock has a market cap of $124.62 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 37.10, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.86 and a beta of 1.77. Western Digital has a 1 year low of $35.51 and a 1 year high of $380.65. The firm’s 50 day moving average is $293.17 and its two-hundred day moving average is $217.26.

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 the consensus estimate of $1.93 by $0.20. Western Digital had a net margin of 35.52% and a return on equity of 41.53%. The firm had revenue of $3.02 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.93 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm posted $1.77 earnings per share. The business’s revenue was up 25.2% on a year-over-year basis. On average, sell-side analysts anticipate that Western Digital will post 4.89 EPS for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling at Western Digital

In related news, Director Matthew E. Massengill sold 36,926 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, February 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $260.43, for a total value of $9,616,638.18. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, CEO Irving Tan sold 20,000 shares of Western Digital stock in a transaction on Monday, February 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $255.44, for a total value of $5,108,800.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer owned 623,586 shares in the company, valued at $159,288,807.84. This trade represents a 3.11% decrease in their ownership of the stock. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. Insiders have sold a total of 92,795 shares of company stock valued at $24,265,884 over the last three months. Insiders own 0.18% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in WDC. Tranquility Partners LLC purchased a new stake in Western Digital in the 1st quarter worth approximately $277,000. Kercheville Advisors LLC purchased a new position in Western Digital during the first quarter valued at approximately $325,000. CENTRAL TRUST Co boosted its position in shares of Western Digital by 109.4% in the first quarter. CENTRAL TRUST Co now owns 268 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $72,000 after purchasing an additional 140 shares during the period. Cache Advisors LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Western Digital in the first quarter worth $3,542,000. Finally, Krilogy Financial LLC increased its stake in shares of Western Digital by 40.9% in the first quarter. Krilogy Financial LLC now owns 14,820 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $4,009,000 after purchasing an additional 4,301 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.