Western Digital Corporation

Tesla shares rose 5% after the electric vehicle maker reported third-quarter deliveries of 486,532 vehicles, above the 461,100 units expected by analysts polled by FactSet. Broadcom rose more than 3% after Reuters reported it agreed to lend Anthropic up to $42 billion to finance infrastructure purchases, with investment banks seeking to raise $42 billion of Class A senior secured debt and $18 billion in Class B debt, according to Bloomberg. Nike fell almost 6% after its fiscal first-quarter revenue missed analyst expectations, with a 4% slide in sales tied to declines in China and plans to lay off staff in 2027. Synaptics surged 14% and ON Semiconductor rose more than 5% after ON Semi revised its buyout offer for Synaptics to $123 a share, or $5.7 billion. Seagate and Western Digital each tumbled 13% following a Nikkei report that Japan's Toshiba will double its hard disk drive production capacity for data centers and invest $380 million to expand facilities in the Philippines.

Nike shares fell more than 10% in premarket trading after the company missed revenue expectations against LSEG consensus for its fiscal first quarter, reporting sales down 4% on declines in its China business and announcing plans to lay off staff in 2027. Synaptics shares jumped over 14% and ON Semiconductor shares rose more than 7% following reports that ON Semiconductor will acquire Synaptics for $123 per share in cash, a transaction now valued at $5.7 billion, down from the prior agreement of $7 billion. Nexalin Technology shares dropped over 18% premarket after the medical device company announced a 10-year distribution and manufacturing deal with Inovanexa Medical Technologies on Thursday, clearing its Nexalin Sync neurostimulation device for distribution across seven South American countries. Vylor shares gained slightly after the seeds and genetics company was added to the S&P 500 on Thursday, following its spinoff from Corteva, which will move to the S&P MidCap 400. Seagate Technology and Western Digital shares fell over 11% and 8% respectively after a Nikkei report that Toshiba will double its production capacity for data-center hard disk drives and invest $380 million to expand facilities in the Philippines.

Seagate and Western Digital shares fell 7% and 5%, respectively, in premarket trading on Friday after Nikkei Asia reported that Toshiba could double the amount of hard disk drive supply available. The Japanese company is set to invest roughly $380M in the Philippines to expand facilities and create a more stable supply of components needed for AI infrastructure, the outlet added. The expansion would be Toshiba's first major investment in hard disk drives in roughly five years, and the company is also working on new products aimed at increasing per-unit memory capacity. Toshiba holds roughly 10% of the storage market, behind Seagate and Western Digital. Seagate, Western Digital, and Toshiba did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Seeking Alpha.

Toshiba plans to double its production capacity for hard disk drives used in artificial intelligence data centres by fiscal 2027, Nikkei reported on Friday. The Japanese technology group will invest about 60 billion yen, or $380 million, to expand its HDD manufacturing facilities in the Philippines, marking its first major drive-related investment in roughly five years. Toshiba, one of the world's three largest HDD makers alongside U.S. firms Western Digital and Seagate, aims to raise its market share by storage capacity from just over 10% to 30% over the medium term. The expansion will include new production lines for drives with up to 40% higher per-unit capacity and support Toshiba's plans for mass production of 65-terabyte-class HDDs by 2030, eventually targeting 100-terabyte-class products. HDD demand has strengthened as AI infrastructure expands, with cheaper storage costs compared with solid-state drives encouraging data centres to deploy more high-capacity drives.

Western Digital announced the redemption of all $109.5 million of its 3% convertible notes, sending shares down 4.8% in the afternoon session. Under the terms set for November 16, 2026, noteholders may convert their notes beforehand, with principal settled in cash and any remaining value delivered in common stock. The decline came alongside broader selling pressure across AI memory and storage stocks, with peers including Micron, SanDisk, and SK Hynix also falling as investors reassessed the industry outlook amid analyst price target reviews and potential demand risks. After the initial drop, the shares recovered some losses to trade at $427.89, down 4.2% from the previous close. Western Digital is up 128% since the beginning of the year but remains 42.7% below its 52-week high of $746.23 from June 2026.

Jim Cramer said Monday that growing political opposition to data center construction is shifting the advantage toward the largest technology companies at the expense of smaller, speculative developers. The "Mad Money" host said the data center thesis, perhaps the greatest investment theme in a generation, is now under attack and may never be the same, citing Pennsylvania and Texas as illustrations where governors once advocates for data center growth have lately demanded more stringent conditions on new projects. Amazon, Alphabet, Microsoft, and Meta are best positioned to navigate the new landscape, Cramer argued, because the scale of their balance sheets lets them clear regulatory and community hurdles that would be prohibitive for smaller operators. He added that if speculative developers exit the market, hyperscalers could face less pressure on land, power, and workforce availability, which might translate into lower construction costs as they press ahead with AI infrastructure. Cramer cautioned that with the buildout trajectory in question, the market may no longer justify elevated multiples for suppliers like GE Vernova, which makes gas turbines, or memory-chip companies including Micron, Sandisk, Western Digital, and Seagate, regardless of how robust end demand proves to be. Despite his more cautious outlook for parts of the data center trade, Cramer stopped short of calling the broader theme finished, saying rules can be crafted and communities can be appeased, but the unbridled buildout is most likely over.

Baidu shares plunged 12.7% after the company reported second-quarter 2026 adjusted earnings of $1.06 per share, widely missing the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $1.51. Western Digital shares slid 7.4% amid a rough session for tech stocks. ExxonMobil Holdings shares rose 2.5% as energy emerged as one of the biggest winning sectors. Amer Sports shares gained 3.2% after reporting second-quarter fiscal 2026 adjusted earnings of 22 cents per share, beating the Zacks Consensus Estimate of 11 cents.

SanDisk, the flash-memory business spun off from Western Digital, outlined a US$93.9 billion customer backlog at its recent Investor Day and is targeting 80% margins through 2030, with management linking the outlook to demand for AI-related storage solutions. The update gives Western Digital investors fresh context on how the split is reshaping exposure to higher-margin storage opportunities, as Western Digital remains focused on hard disk drive storage across the US, Asia, Europe, the Middle East and Africa. SanDisk's backlog and margin targets highlight how the separation concentrates much of the flash and AI-oriented storage exposure in the spin-off entity rather than the parent, leaving Western Digital more concentrated in capacity-driven cloud and AI archives. The core Western Digital narrative still leans on deep hyperscaler partnerships, ePMR and UltraSMR adoption, and the future HAMR roadmap, not on NAND margins, and SanDisk's outlook reinforces one of the key narrative risks: Western Digital's dependence on a narrower set of technologies and a concentrated group of cloud customers for long-term growth. Investors can track whether management points to multi-year hyperscaler contracts and healthy uptake of UltraSMR and upcoming HAMR products at events such as the Open Storage Summit on 11 August 2026 as confirmation that the HDD-focused model is gaining traction.

U.S. stocks were mixed on Thursday as a rebound in chipmakers and stronger-than-expected economic data helped offset a sell-off in software shares following disappointing earnings. The S&P 500 edged up 0.07%, the Dow fell 0.38%, and the Nasdaq 100 added 0.26%. Datadog tumbled over 14% after reporting second-quarter adjusted gross margin below consensus, dragging down other software names including Salesforce, Atlassian, and Workday. AppLovin sank 19% on a revenue miss, while memory chipmakers Western Digital and SanDisk fell sharply after SanDisk forecast first-quarter revenue of $10.30 billion to $10.80 billion, below the $11.16 billion consensus. Limiting losses, ARM Holdings rose more than 5% and ASML, ON Semiconductor, and Marvel Technology gained over 2%, while Paycom Software surged 22% after raising its full-year revenue outlook to $2.20 billion to $2.21 billion, above estimates. Weekly jobless claims rose by 1,000 to 199,000, better than the 205,000 expected, and second-quarter nonfarm productivity increased 1.4%, exceeding the 0.6% forecast. A Financial Times report that Fed Chair Warsh is willing to raise rates in September if inflation firms weighed on sentiment, while crude oil rose over 1% after Yemen's Houthi rebels said they targeted a Saudi oil tanker in the Gulf of Aden.

Sandisk Corp. projected fiscal first-quarter revenue of $10.3 billion to $10.8 billion and adjusted earnings of $44 to $46 per share, both above Wall Street estimates, yet its stock fell sharply before the opening bell and dragged down the broader memory-chip sector. Western Digital dropped by double digits, while Micron and Seagate fell roughly 4%, and SK Hynix and Samsung also suffered steep declines in South Korea. The sell-off reflects how elevated investor expectations have become after memory and storage stocks surged on demand from artificial-intelligence data centers, with strong results no longer sufficient when continued growth and higher memory prices are already priced in. Demand from data centers remains healthy, but weaker consumer electronics and personal-computer markets could limit some of that momentum.

Micron Technology fell more than 3% in premarket trading after Sandisk's forward guidance raised concerns that the memory industry's rapid growth is heavily dependent on pricing gains rather than volume increases. Sandisk reported stronger-than-expected quarterly revenue and earnings, but management noted that roughly two-thirds of its recent revenue growth came from higher prices, with only one-third from increased shipment volumes. Consumer memory revenue dropped 32% sequentially to $556 million, and Sandisk expects personal-computer and smartphone shipments to decline by a mid-teen percentage this year, highlighting weakness outside AI data centers. The selloff spread across the sector, with Western Digital, SK Hynix, and Samsung also declining sharply. Investors will now focus on Micron's upcoming shipment growth and pricing commentary for evidence that AI demand can sustain the rally without relying mainly on higher prices.

Western Digital stock plunged 11.7% through 10:30 a.m. ET Thursday despite beating on both sales and earnings in its fiscal Q4 2026 update. The company reported non-GAAP earnings of $3.56 per share on sales of $3.75 billion, exceeding analyst expectations of $3.29 per share on sales of less than $3.7 billion. GAAP earnings reached $8.21 per share, up 1,125% year over year, driven by a 44% surge in sales fueled by AI-related demand for computer memory. For fiscal Q1 2027, Western Digital guided for sales growth of 42% to 49%, with projected revenue between $4 billion and $4.2 billion and non-GAAP earnings between $3.85 and $4.15, also above consensus. The sell-off occurred despite accelerating growth and an upbeat outlook, with one analyst calling the decline unjustified and expecting a quick reversal.

Storage and memory stocks sold off sharply early Thursday, with Western Digital shares sliding 16% to $437, SanDisk stock dropping 11% to $1,198, and Micron Technology falling 6% to $844. The declines came despite both Western Digital and SanDisk beating fiscal Q4 2026 estimates after Wednesday's close, as their outlooks failed to clear a sky-high bar set by year-to-date rallies that had SanDisk up 469% and Western Digital up 202%. SanDisk guided Q1 FY27 revenue to $10.3 billion to $10.8 billion, with the midpoint below the $10.8 billion consensus, even as CEO David Goeckeler said SanDisk now has over four years of demand visibility and signed five new long-term deals worth $94 billion in minimum revenue and $91 billion in remaining performance obligations. The selloff extended across the group, with Seagate Technology down 6% to $786 and the Roundhill Memory ETF declining 7% to $50, while analysts trimmed targets but remained constructive, with UBS lowering its Western Digital price target to $525 from $560 and Citi opening an upside 90-day view on SanDisk stock.

U.S. stock index futures were little changed on Thursday as investors weighed a potential Strait of Hormuz reopening and renewed AI spending concerns. Paycom Software surged 13.1% after reporting adjusted earnings of $2.78 per share, well above the $2.38 estimate, on revenue of $531.2 million. Data storage companies declined sharply, with Western Digital slumping 14.6% and Sandisk falling 9.2%, as their results failed to meet elevated AI-driven expectations. LegalZoom plunged 23% after cutting its full-year revenue forecast, citing a slowdown in Google Search traffic. Honeywell Aerospace fell 13.1% after slashing its full-year outlook in its first report as an independent company.

Wall Street was set for a mixed open on Thursday, with Nasdaq futures down 0.7% after chipmakers Sandisk and Advanced Micro Devices and data storage company Western Digital reported earnings that failed to meet investors' lofty expectations, while S&P 500 e-minis nudged up 0.1%. European markets rallied, with the pan-European STOXX 600 touching an all-time high, up 0.4%, driven by media and telecoms stocks. Oil prices rose, with Brent crude up 1.1% at $80.34 a barrel, despite a proposed Iran-Oman deal aimed at ending the U.S.-Iran conflict. Markets also awaited U.S. jobless claims data and Friday's non-farm payrolls report.

Several stocks made significant premarket moves following earnings reports and guidance updates. Peloton Interactive sank nearly 14% after reporting a year-over-year decline in active paying subscribers of 8.8%, despite revenue topping expectations. Moderna rose 4% after the FDA approved its mRNA flu vaccine, mFlusiva, for adults 50 and older. Versant Media jumped 5% after raising its full-year outlook and beating top and bottom lines, now expecting 2026 revenue of $6.2 billion to $6.45 billion and adjusted EBITDA of $1.9 billion to $2.05 billion. Warby Parker shed 7% after second-quarter revenue of $235.5 million missed the LSEG consensus estimate of $238 million, though EBITDA topped expectations and full-year guidance was reaffirmed. IonQ rose 3.9% on better-than-expected second-quarter revenue and full-year revenue guidance of $280 million to $290 million, exceeding the FactSet consensus of $268.6 million. Sandisk slid 10% as first-quarter revenue guidance of $10.3 billion to $10.8 billion appeared to disappoint traders, with the LSEG consensus at $10.47 billion, despite fourth-quarter beats. Figma shed 14% after full-year adjusted operating income guidance of $125 million to $135 million came in soft versus the FactSet consensus of $133.2 million. DoorDash added 4% after quarterly revenue of $4.45 billion beat the LSEG consensus of $4.34 billion. Zillow slid more than 11% after expanding CFO Jeremy Hofmann's role to include COO, while also reporting adjusted EPS of 52 cents beating estimates of 45 cents and revenue of $772 million beating estimates of $758 million, a day after announcing about 500 layoffs. Western Digital slumped more than 15% as current-quarter projections underwhelmed, calling for adjusted earnings of $4 a share on revenue of $4.1 billion, versus consensus of $3.81 a share on $4.04 billion. Salesforce fell almost 5% after naming Miguel Milano as operating chief. Duolingo tumbled 7% after current-quarter revenue guidance of $302 million missed the FactSet consensus of $303.9 million. Bumble fell 5% after posting a second-quarter loss of 84 cents per share versus an expected profit of 25 cents, and issuing third-quarter adjusted EBITDA guidance of $56 million to $60 million below the $68.7 million consensus. AppLovin tanked nearly 20% after third-quarter adjusted EBITDA guidance of $1.71 billion to $1.74 billion missed the StreetAccount consensus of $1.75 billion.

US stock futures barely budged on Thursday morning as investors absorbed a wall of earnings reports, prospects of an imminent Strait of Hormuz deal, and fresh labor market data, with the Dow trading at a record high. Futures on the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.2% after the blue-chip index extended its record-breaking win streak, while futures on the S&P 500 gained 0.1% and contracts for the Nasdaq-100 dipped 0.1%. Investors remain hyper-focused on AI capital requirements and monetization, with punishing earnings reactions for some AI highfliers such as AMD, Sandisk, and Western Digital. SpaceX stock remains near all-time lows as a lockup period expires on Thursday, potentially putting pressure on the stock should insiders sell their shares, while Nvidia stock rose over 3% on Wednesday after SpaceX said it would exclusively use Nvidia chips. Geopolitical uncertainty continues to hang over markets, helping to send gold prices to multiweek highs, and oil prices steadied near $80 per barrel after Iran said it had reached an agreement with Oman for a temporary shipping route through the Strait of Hormuz. In economic data, markets are set to get a Challenger, Gray & Christmas report on layoffs and initial jobless claims on Thursday, setting the stage for Friday's July employment report.