NEW YORK, May 21, 2026, 15:07 (EDT)
- Sandisk shares added about 10% in afternoon trading, as the stock kept up its strong AI-fueled rally.
- Management told investors this week the flash-memory market might stay tight longer.
- Citi raised its price target to $2,025. Western Digital and Micron shares also moved up.
Sandisk Corp surged roughly 10% Thursday as the flash-memory stock tracked Wall Street’s AI names. Management told investors that NAND flash supply is still tight. Shares last traded at $1,533.00 as of 2:52 p.m. EDT, after hitting a high of $1,538.39 earlier in the day.
Investors are looking at storage stocks differently now, seeing them as a clear winner from artificial-intelligence spending instead of just another hardware play later in the cycle. Sandisk makes products for data centers, edge devices and consumer storage, supplying NAND-based drives, cards, USB sticks, wafers and other parts, according to ‘ company profile.
Sandisk was in focus after management showed up at J.P. Morgan’s technology, media and communications conference on Wednesday. The company had previously listed May 20 for that event, with more on the calendar at Bernstein and Mizuho.
David Goeckeler, the chief executive, told investors the flash market is likely to remain “undersupplied for a long period of time,” Barron’s reported. He described the old cycles in memory as “really corrosive.” Luis Visoso, the CFO, said customers are now asking, “how can you ensure there will be supply?” Barron’s
J.P. Morgan’s semiconductor analyst Harlan Sur told the conference that storage tech is a “critical part” of AI because inferencing demands more memory and storage. Seeking Alpha’s transcript showed Goeckeler and Visoso speaking for Sandisk at the May 20 event. Seeking Alpha
Analysts are bumping targets on Sandisk after its recent run. Citi’s Asiya Merchant increased her target price to $2,025 from $1,300 while keeping a Buy, Barron’s said, mentioning higher demand for Sandisk’s enterprise solid-state drives used in AI data centers. Out of 26 analysts in FactSet, 20 rate the stock Buy, according to the report.
Sandisk bulls got a boost from the company’s latest numbers. The storage maker posted third-quarter revenue of $5.95 billion, up 97% from the last quarter. GAAP net income came in at $3.62 billion, or $23.03 a share diluted. Sandisk said results were driven by a shift toward higher-value customers and more demand from datacenters.
Western Digital, which used to own Sandisk, rose 4.5%. Micron Technology picked up 2.4% as well. The rally wasn’t just in one name, with investors still moving into the wider memory and storage sector.
Sandisk shares moved more than the broader indexes. The Nasdaq Composite edged up 0.07% and the S&P 500 gained 0.15%, according to Reuters market data. The action in Sandisk looks tied to the supply and AI demand news, not a general move in tech stocks.
That setup has its risks. Memory markets have swung from shortages to gluts before, usually when orders stall or suppliers build out capacity. Sandisk’s current valuation gives it less cushion if demand slips. Shares could take a hit if AI data-center spending gets delayed, supply loosens, or prices on long-term contracts soften.
Right now, scarcity is driving prices. Sandisk shares are telling investors that AI has shifted the usual storage cycle, at least for now.
