NEW YORK, December 29, 2025, 21:12 ET — Market closed
- Western Digital shares fell about 1% to $179.68 at the close.
- The stock traded in a wide $176.70-$184.77 range as year-end volatility picked up.
- Traders are watching Fed minutes on Tuesday and the company’s next results, listed for Jan. 22.
Western Digital Corp shares slipped 1.0% on Monday to close at $179.68, after swinging between $176.70 and $184.77 in choppy year-end trade.
The move matters because Western Digital has been one of 2025’s standout AI infrastructure winners, helped by demand for high-capacity hard drives used in AI data centers. Barron’s said Western Digital is up 303% this year, while rival Seagate has gained 232%.
Investors now head into a thin final stretch of the year with minutes from the Federal Reserve’s Dec. 9-10 meeting due at 2 p.m. ET Tuesday — a detailed account of policymakers’ debate that can sway rate expectations. MarketWatch said U.S. stock markets will be open on Dec. 31 but closed on Jan. 1, with weekly jobless claims scheduled for Dec. 31; MarketWatch also lists Western Digital’s next earnings date as Jan. 22, 2026.
Broader equities ended lower on Monday as heavyweight tech shares pulled back from last week’s gains, with the S&P 500 down 0.35% and the Nasdaq off 0.50%, according to Reuters. “It’ll turn out to be a buying opportunity,” Hank Smith, head of investment strategy at Haverford Trust, told Reuters. Reuters
Western Digital often trades as a high-beta proxy for cloud spending and the AI hardware buildout, so a pullback in large-cap tech can pressure the stock even on a quiet company-news day.
The late-December tape can also amplify swings, especially in names that have logged big runs and carry momentum-style positioning.
Western Digital is now focused on hard disk drives after completing the separation of its flash business into Sandisk in February 2025, the company said. In its most recent quarterly update, it forecast fiscal second-quarter revenue of about $2.9 billion, plus or minus $100 million, and non-GAAP EPS — adjusted profit that excludes certain items — of about $1.88, plus or minus $0.15.
Seagate remains the closest U.S.-listed peer in HDDs, and both names sit in the same investor bucket: suppliers tied to hyperscalers, meaning the largest cloud operators building out data centers.
Before the next session, traders will watch whether the Fed minutes shift expectations for the path of interest rates, a key driver of valuation for tech and AI-linked stocks.
Any sharp move in Treasury yields after the minutes can ripple into hardware suppliers tied to data-center spending, with liquidity typically thinner in the final sessions of the year.
On the chart, Monday’s $176.70 low is near-term support, while the day’s $184.77 high marks a resistance zone traders will be watching if the stock tries to rebound.
For Western Digital, the next major company catalyst is the January results date listed on major calendars, when investors will gauge demand, pricing and whether the company stays on track with its fiscal second-quarter outlook.
