SmarTrend is bullish on shares of WDC and our subscribers received an Uptrend alert on November 09, 2009 at $37.06, which has returned 5.4% to date.

Write to Chip Brian at cbrian@tradethetrend.com

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The live and archived webcast of this event will be available on the Presentations page in the Investor Relations section of WD's Web site at http://www.westerndigital.com/investor/.

About WD

WD, one of the storage industry's pioneers and long-time leaders, provides products and services for people and organizations that collect, manage and use digital information. The company designs and produces reliable, high-performance hard drives and solid state drives that keep users' data accessible and secure from loss. Its advanced technologies are configured into applications for client and enterprise computing, embedded systems and consumer electronics, as well as its own consumer storage and media products.

WD was founded in 1970. The company's storage products are marketed to leading OEMs, systems manufacturers, selected resellers and retailers under the Western Digital(R) and WD brand names. Visit the Investor section of the company's Web site (www.westerndigital.com) to access a variety of financial and investor information.

Western Digital, WD, and the WD logo are registered trademarks of Western Digital Technologies, Inc. in the U.S. and other countries. All other trademarks herein are property of their respective owner.

(Logo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20000711/WDCLOGO)

SOURCE Western Digital Corp.

http://www.westerndigital.com

Western Digital manufactures hard drives for electronic devices, including PCs and netbooks.

Western Digital Crushed Estimates in Fiscal Fourth Quarter 2009

On July 28, Western Digital reported its fiscal fourth-quarter results which saw it surprising on the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 181.48%. Earnings per share were 76 cents compared to the Zacks Consensus Estimate of 27 cents.

Revenue, however, fell to $1.9 billion on 40 million hard drives shipped from $2 billion and 35.2 million hard drives shipped in the year ago period.

Cash Hoard Grows

Western Digital is a cash generating machine. In the fiscal fourth quarter, it added $349 million in cash which brings its total cash hoard to $1.8 billion as of the end of June.

Zacks Consensus Estimates Jumping

As the stock has soared, so have the estimates. The fiscal first quarter Zacks Consensus Estimate is up 8 cents to 89 cents in just the last month.

Fiscal 2010 estimates climbed 7.9% to $3.54 per share in the last 30 days with 6 out of 16 raising in that time period. One analyst also raised in the last week. Analysts now expect year over year earnings growth in fiscal 2010 of 39.52%.

Western Digital is scheduled to report first quarter 2010 results on Oct 15.

Value Fundamentals

Despite the huge surge in the stock, Western Digital is still an attractive value stock. It is trading with a forward P/E of 10.22 and a price-to-book ratio of 2.53. The company also has a stellar 5-year average return on equity (ROE) of 33.94%.

1-Year Chart:

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