NEW YORK, December 29, 2025, 15:23 ET — Regular session
- Western Digital shares fell about 0.8% to $180.15 in afternoon trading, after swinging between $176.80 and $184.60.
- The stock moved with a softer tape as major U.S. indexes slipped and trading stayed light in the holiday-affected final week of 2025. Reuters
- Barron’s recently flagged Western Digital as the top performer in the S&P 500 in 2025, putting extra focus on whether AI-driven data-center demand can hold into 2026. Barron’s
Shares of Western Digital Corp fell about 0.8% to $180.15 by mid-afternoon in New York on Monday, trimming gains after an intraday rebound from the session’s low.
The dip matters now because Western Digital has been a standout winner in 2025, leaving little room for disappointment as investors head into the new year. Barron’s said the stock is up about 303% in 2025, putting it at the top of the S&P 500’s leaderboard. Barron’s
With markets entering the last stretch of the year, moves can look larger than the day’s headlines justify because volumes are thinner and positioning shifts faster. Traders have also been debating whether the market gets a “Santa Claus rally” — a seasonal pattern of gains in the last five trading days of the year and the first two in January. Reuters
Broader market pressure set the tone. Wall Street’s main indexes were lower on Monday as heavyweight technology names pulled back from last week’s run, Reuters reported. Reuters
Western Digital’s storage peers were mixed. Seagate Technology shares were down about 1.0% at $283.37, while memory-chip maker Micron Technology rose about 2.9% to $293.05.
The bigger story for Western Digital is how much AI is changing storage demand. Seagate CEO Dave Mosley told Barron’s that AI is “fundamentally reshaping hard drive demand by elevating the economic value of data and data storage.” Barron’s
Western Digital sells hard disk drives — including high-capacity models used in cloud data centers — alongside products for client devices and consumers. That leaves the shares sensitive to spending by large cloud operators, often called “hyperscalers,” such as the biggest public-cloud providers. Reuters
The company has also become a more concentrated bet on hard drives after restructuring its portfolio. Western Digital said it completed the separation of its flash business into a separate company, Sandisk, in February 2025. Western Digital
In its most recent quarterly update, Western Digital reported fiscal first-quarter 2026 revenue of $2.82 billion, up 27% year over year, and forecast fiscal second-quarter revenue of about $2.9 billion plus or minus $100 million. Western Digital
Investors are likely to focus on whether that momentum continues through 2026, particularly on pricing and mix for high-capacity drives. The company previously pointed to “continued revenue growth driven by data center demand” and highlighted free cash flow — cash left after capital spending — as a key measure of execution. Western Digital
Macro risks are also back on the checklist. Minutes from the Federal Reserve’s prior meeting and weekly jobless-claims data are due in a week Reuters described as otherwise light on economic releases, with U.S. markets shut on Thursday for New Year’s Day. Reuters
For Western Digital, the near-term question is whether the stock’s AI-driven rerating can absorb a normal bout of profit-taking into year-end, or whether investors start demanding clearer evidence that data-center buildouts will keep translating into orders and margins in 2026. Barron’s
