Western Digital Corporation $WDC Stake Lowered by Hilltop Holdings Inc.

Hilltop Holdings Inc. trimmed its stake in shares of Western Digital Corporation (NASDAQ:WDC) by 71.7% during the first quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 2,193 shares of the data storage provider’s stock after selling 5,566 shares during the quarter. Hilltop Holdings Inc.’s holdings in Western Digital were worth $593,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Several other hedge funds have also made changes to their positions in WDC. Norges Bank bought a new position in Western Digital during the 4th quarter worth $788,729,000. Soroban Capital Partners LP lifted its stake in Western Digital by 1,926.3% in the second quarter. Soroban Capital Partners LP now owns 3,061,134 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $195,882,000 after buying an additional 2,910,062 shares during the last quarter. Polar Capital Holdings Plc acquired a new position in shares of Western Digital during the third quarter valued at $221,800,000. National Pension Service boosted its holdings in shares of Western Digital by 267.6% during the fourth quarter. National Pension Service now owns 1,691,659 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $291,422,000 after acquiring an additional 1,231,477 shares during the period. Finally, AQR Capital Management LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Western Digital by 70.4% during the fourth quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 2,972,703 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $512,107,000 after acquiring an additional 1,228,661 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 92.51% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of research firms recently weighed in on WDC. Wells Fargo & Company increased their price objective on shares of Western Digital from $575.00 to $730.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Friday, July 10th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upped their target price on shares of Western Digital from $530.00 to $650.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Friday, June 12th. Susquehanna raised their price target on shares of Western Digital from $360.00 to $500.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Wednesday, July 8th. Zacks Research raised Western Digital from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, May 6th. Finally, Barclays boosted their price objective on Western Digital from $450.00 to $620.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, May 27th. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, eighteen have issued a Buy rating and four have given a Hold rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $520.32.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, CEO Irving Tan sold 20,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on 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 completion of the sale, the chief executive officer directly owned 598,150 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $246,342,096. This trade represents a 3.24% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, insider Cynthia L. Tregillis sold 432 shares of Western Digital stock in a transaction on Friday, June 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $545.60, for a total value of $235,699.20. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider owned 116,643 shares in the company, valued at $63,640,420.80. The trade was a 0.37% decrease in their ownership of the stock. 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 28,959 shares of company stock worth $12,631,666 over the last quarter. 0.18% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Western Digital Trading Down 4.2%

NASDAQ:WDC opened at $497.92 on Tuesday. The company has a 50-day moving average of $565.69 and a 200-day moving average of $400.49. The firm has a market cap of $171.62 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 29.73 and a beta of 2.11. Western Digital Corporation has a twelve month low of $68.67 and a twelve month high of $799.87.

Western Digital (NASDAQ:WDC) last released its earnings results on Thursday, April 30th. The data storage provider reported $2.72 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.39 by $0.33. Western Digital had a net margin of 55.29% and a return on equity of 42.95%. The business had revenue of $3.34 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $3.25 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $1.36 EPS. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 45.5% on a year-over-year basis. Western Digital has set its Q4 2026 guidance at 3.100-3.400 EPS. On average, research analysts forecast that Western Digital Corporation will post 9.61 earnings per share for the current year.

Western Digital Increases Dividend

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

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.