Halloween Sale
50% off Premium Yearly
Opinions Darren Sissons
Western DigitalWDCHOLDJun 18, 2020
Darren SissonsStock price when the opinion was issued
As of Oct 16, 2026. Market Open.
You might be interested:
;fill-opacity:1;'/%3e%3cpath%20d='M31%2018.6001V30H8V18.6001L14.1334%2022.4334L19.4999%2014L24.8669%2022.4334L31%2018.6001Z'%20fill='%23EE5432'%20style='fill:%23EE5432;fill:color(display-p3%200.9340%200.3310%200.1956);fill-opacity:1;'/%3e%3c/svg%3e){kind=small}
Premium contentOur PAST TOP PICK with WDC has triggered its stop at $350. To remain disciplined, we recommend covering the position at this time. When combined with previous guidance, this will result in a net investment loss of 24%.
Premium contentWe reiterate WDC, provider of data storage for data centers, as a TOP PICK. Cash reserves are prudently being used to aggressively retire debt and buy back shares. It trades at 19x earnings and supports a remarkable 130% ROE. We recommend trailing up the stop (from $300) to $350, looking to achieve $583 -- upside potential of 28%. Yield 0.1%
(Analysts’ price target is $684.23)
Premium contentIts price stands at around $475.13 USD. It suffered an intraday plunge of 17.7% to 19.1%, marking its worst daily drop since April 2025. The stock was trading strongly near $548 USD on Tuesday but retreated sharply, wiping out recent gains following the earnings call on Wednesday afternoon. Social media mentions are up 1,053% in the past 24h.
Premium contentThe drive to create AI and data centres requires massive memory and data storage -- WDC's wheelhouse. Recently reported earnings showed a 44% increase in revenues and EPS beat analyst expectations. Management expects a similar growth in revenue next quarter. Quarterly cash reserves are growing, while shares are aggressively bought back and debt reduced. It trades at 28x earnings and supports a remarkable 85% ROE. We recommend setting a stop-loss at $300, looking to achieve $674 -- upside potential of 45%. Yield 0.1%
(Analysts’ price target is $674.17)Storage is crucial now for AI and more and more is needed.
Joe TerranovaMemory/storage is one of the hottest sectors. The best performer Sandisk gained 143%, Seagate 48%, Micron 45% and Western Digital 45%, because of surging demand from data centres, driven by AI. They reported last week a solid beat and excellent guidance. However, once competitors add more capacity, these high share prices may be hard to maintain.
After the spinoff of the flash drive business, this is now a hard drive disk business. Over time, solid-state drives have taken away from hard drive disks in modern computers. That's been a challenge for the storage companies.
But AI has increased need for mass capacity storage at data centres, and those are hard drive disks. Tailwind for WDC. His firm tends to stay away from hardware in general. In AI, there are much cleaner stories with less cyclicality. He can't either recommend or criticize a buy on this one.
China is building out its own technology hardware industry. China was the biggest net importer relative to their needs and will now displace US market share. This is a trade that you buy when it is weak. Don't add fresh money. He would prefer TSM-N.