Shares of Lake Forest disk drive maker Western Digital Corp. rose after the company reported quarterly results that trumped Wall Street’s expectations.
Investors didn’t seem surprised by the better-than-expected news. Shares were up 2% in afterhours trading on a recent market value of about $7 billion.
Western Digital reported sales of $1.9 billion, roughly flat from the same period a year earlier but beating analysts’ expected $1.6 billion in revenue.
Excluding charges for restructuring, acquisitions, research and development and other costs, the company posted profits of $173 million, down 19% from the year-ago quarter but soundly beating analysts’ expected $62 million in profits.
The company said it shipped 40 million disk drives during the quarter. It ended the quarter with $1.8 billion in cash and short-term assets.
Last month, Western Digital upped its outlook for the three months through July 3, but it didn’t give any specific dollar amounts.
The company said demand “is tracking ahead of expectations” and that its stockpiles remain at “historically low levels.”
It also said that declines in the average selling prices of hard drives that go into computers, consumer electronics and other devices “have been at the lower end of the anticipated range.”
Disk drive industry analysts have been wrestling to pinpoint indications of true demand.
Western Digital and other computer products makers have seen a slight uptick in orders since the start of the year, but it’s unclear if this is due to demand improving or manufacturers restocking inventory that had fallen to low levels.
For the current quarter, analysts are looking for profits of $107 million on sales of $1.7 billion.
The company didn’t give an outlook for the September quarter in its earnings release.
