NEW YORK, June 22, 2026, 5:48 a.m. ET —
- WDC was quoted at $746.23, adding $34.58, or 4.86%, as traders put new money into memory-and-storage stocks on the AI storage-scarcity story.
- The story is more than just today’s trading: WD forecasted fiscal Q4 revenue at $3.65 billion midpoint, looking for a non-GAAP gross margin between 51% and 52% and non-GAAP EPS at $3.25.
- Today is important for structure. In a June 11 8-K, Western Digital said it expected to finish exchanging remaining Sandisk shares for WDC stock on June 22.
Western Digital Corporation (NASDAQ: WDC) jumped early Monday, last seen at $746.23, up $34.58 or 4.86% from Friday’s close. Investors are moving into AI storage and betting on a squeeze, with a corporate event in play: WDC’s exchange of its remaining Sandisk shares for company stock expected to wrap today. The Wall Street Journal’s live markets section pointed out WDC as the top mover among memory stocks on shortage-driven price action, and WDC’s 8-K also listed today as the expected close for the Sandisk deal.
Western Digital Corporation (NASDAQ: WDC) isn’t trading like a run-of-the-mill storage play now. The live quote puts its market cap close to $257.2 billion and shows a trailing P/E around 44.6x. The move signals that the market is betting on stickier hard-drive pricing, not just a bounce from last quarter.
For traders, the takeaway is this: Monday’s $34.58 per-share jump tacked on about $11.9 billion in paper equity value, based on WDC’s April 23 share count. That’s about 3.3x management’s fiscal Q4 revenue midpoint. It’s a sharp message on valuation. The tape is paying up for scarcity, not just for sales.
The margin numbers matter too. At the midpoint, WD’s fiscal Q4 revenue is $3.65 billion. Every point of gross margin means about $36.5 million in gross profit. With a 16% tax rate and around 385 million diluted shares, that works out to roughly $0.08 per share in EPS for the quarter if nothing else changes. Investors watching HDD prices are really tracking margin swings.
Customer demand is the trigger this time. Reuters says Apple wants to hike product prices to make up for higher memory and storage chip costs, quoting CEO Tim Cook in The Wall Street Journal. For WDC, that’s a clear signal — if Apple won’t eat storage inflation, the market sees suppliers as price makers.
Morgan Stanley’s call on Western Digital still has teeth even after the stock blew past it. Barron’s said Morgan Stanley analyst Erik Woodring raised his price target on WDC to $650 from $488, pointing to AI-fueled HDD demand. He sees demand running at 40% to 50% yearly, outpacing the 30% to 35% rate for supply. The stock is already about 14.8% above that new target.
Western Digital Corporation’s latest earnings gave bulls new fuel. Fiscal Q3 revenue hit $3.34 billion, up 45% year over year. Non-GAAP gross margin came in at 50.5%. Free cash flow reached $978 million. CEO Irving Tan summed up the AI storage case: “Virtually every AI workload” creates data stored on HDDs. Western Digital Corporation
CFO Kris Sennesael’s outlook kept the stock moving. “Our business continues to strengthen,” he said. Sennesael set the fiscal Q4 midpoint at $3.65 billion in revenue, a 51.5% non-GAAP gross margin, and $3.25 in non-GAAP EPS. Investors grabbed hold. That’s what’s carrying the shares higher in early New York trading. Western Digital Corporation
Western Digital is a different company from years past. The fiscal Q3 filing says after the February 2025 split, Sandisk’s results won’t be in WDC’s numbers. The company expects to exchange 1,038,681 Sandisk shares for WDC shares held by institutional investors today. It’s less about the old mixed business, more focused now on pure AI storage capacity.
WD’s numbers show why traders are putting it in the AI infrastructure camp instead of PC hardware. In its Q3 presentation, cloud made up 89% of revenue. A survey from May said 87% of customers saw capacity expansion and optimizing total cost of ownership as their top needs. “AI is a data systems challenge, not just a compute challenge,” chief product officer Ahmed Shihab said.
The bear setup on WDC is clear: the stock price doesn’t leave much room for slip-ups. If it falls through the implied former close at $711.65, that would unwind today’s jump. WDC is also trading at a 44.6x P/E, and already sits above Morgan Stanley’s $650 price target, so it’s vulnerable if HDD shortages get better, if hyperscale buyers hold off, or if pricing softens. In its forward guidance, the company warns on tariffs, supplier and customer risks, shifting demand, competition on price, supply chain issues, and customer concentration.
Right now, it’s less about traders getting the AI-storage story—they get it. The bigger question is whether the June 22 Sandisk exchange wraps up without a hitch and if WD shows its 51% to 52% gross-margin guidance is about a real, lasting shortage, not just the latest hot semiconductor theme with buzzier headlines.
