StockNews.com Begins Coverage on Western Digital (NASDAQ:WDC)

Research analysts at StockNews.com started coverage on shares of Western Digital (NASDAQ:WDC – Get Rating) in a note issued to investors on Thursday. The brokerage set a “sell” rating on the data storage provider’s stock.

WDC has been the topic of a number of other reports. Raymond James initiated coverage on shares of Western Digital in a report on Wednesday, March 1st. They set an “outperform” rating and a $46.00 target price on the stock. Mizuho raised shares of Western Digital from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and lifted their price objective for the stock from $38.00 to $50.00 in a research report on Friday, February 10th. BNP Paribas raised shares of Western Digital from an “underperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $42.00 price objective for the company in a research report on Monday, January 23rd. The Goldman Sachs Group cut shares of Western Digital from a “neutral” rating to a “sell” rating and reduced their price objective for the stock from $43.00 to $31.00 in a research report on Thursday, December 15th. Finally, Benchmark raised shares of Western Digital from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Friday, January 6th. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, eight have issued a hold rating and nine have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, Western Digital presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $50.19.

Western Digital Price Performance

Shares of WDC opened at $34.39 on Thursday. The company has a market cap of $10.98 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of -118.59 and a beta of 1.68. Western Digital has a 1-year low of $29.73 and a 1-year high of $63.26. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $39.83 and its 200 day simple moving average is $37.18. The company has a current ratio of 1.91, a quick ratio of 1.05 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.58.

Western Digital (NASDAQ:WDC – Get Rating) last issued its earnings results on Tuesday, January 31st. The data storage provider reported ($0.42) earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of ($0.08) by ($0.34). The firm had revenue of $3.11 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.97 billion. Western Digital had a positive return on equity of 5.78% and a negative net margin of 0.59%. Western Digital’s quarterly revenue was down 35.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $2.03 earnings per share. On average, research analysts forecast that Western Digital will post -4.13 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Western Digital

Institutional investors and hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the company. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD raised its stake in Western Digital by 93.1% during the fourth quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 20,663,972 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $651,948,000 after acquiring an additional 9,961,971 shares in the last quarter. Norges Bank acquired a new position in Western Digital during the fourth quarter worth about $89,074,000. Cibc World Markets Corp raised its stake in Western Digital by 7,409.1% during the fourth quarter. Cibc World Markets Corp now owns 2,186,960 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $68,999,000 after acquiring an additional 2,157,836 shares in the last quarter. Alyeska Investment Group L.P. raised its stake in Western Digital by 249.4% during the fourth quarter. Alyeska Investment Group L.P. now owns 2,553,500 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $80,563,000 after acquiring an additional 1,822,747 shares in the last quarter. Finally, National Bank of Canada FI raised its stake in Western Digital by 4,081.5% during the fourth quarter. National Bank of Canada FI now owns 1,725,982 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $54,455,000 after acquiring an additional 1,684,705 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 85.47% of the company’s stock.

About Western Digital

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Western Digital Corp. engages in the development, manufacture, marketing, and sale of data storage devices and solutions. It operates through the Flash and Hard Disk Drive segments. The Flash segment represents flash-based data storage devices. The Hard Disk Drive segment provides hard disk storage solutions.