The Analyst Day You Don't Want To Miss: Western Digital

On Tuesday, Western Digital Corp (NASDAQ: WDC) will host its first investor day since acquiring SanDisk in May, and Cowen and Company analyst Karl Ackerman said it's one investors “don’t want to miss.”

Leading in, Ackerman maintains an Outperform rating and $70 price target for the stock.

Analyst's Take Ahead Of Event

Western Digital hasn’t provided investors with an updated financial model since its analyst day in September 2012 in the wake of its Hitachi acquisition.

“Now that SanDisk has closed and Western Digital has begun to execute well on both HGST and SNDK integration efforts,” said Ackerman, “we expect the company to increase [emphasis omitted] its non-GAAP gross margin and operating margin targets.”

In addition to the updated targets, the analyst anticipates an outline for Western Digital’s 3D NAND integration (production goal May 2017), an update on management's plan for deleveraging and an update on Samsung licensing royalties' reduction.

“From here, we think investors should continue to stay long the stock, as several catalysts have yet to fully play out,” said Ackerman.

At the time of writing, shares of Western Digital were trading at $63.35 in Monday’s pre-market session.

Image Credit: By Solomon203 (Own work) [CC BY-SA 4.0], via Wikimedia Commons