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Western Digital profit beats as margin hold
US-WESTERNDIGITAL-RESULTS:Western Digital profit beats as margin hold(Reuters) - Western Digital Corp's first-quarter profit topped Wall Street expectations on strong margins from sales to businesses, sending its shares up 4 percent in extended trading.
Net profit more than doubled to $519 million, or $2.06 per share, boosted by the company's acquisition of Hitachi's hard disk drive business earlier this year.
Excluding items, the company earned $2.36 per share. Analysts on average were expecting $2.29, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.
Revenue rose 50 percent to $4.04 billion.
The company had lowered its own revenue outlook at an analyst meet last month, triggering a slew of estimate cuts by analysts. Its shares have also lost over 17 percent in value since then.
First-quarter gross margins came in at 29.57 percent -- mostly in line with the company's long term outlook -- and much higher than pre-Thai flood levels.
Prices of hard-drives zoomed in the aftermath of the Thai floods last year that cramped capacity. But even as production returned to normal levels, Western Digital and rival Seagate Technology Plc maintained their price premiums.
Western Digital shares, which closed at $35.28 on Monday, were up 4 percent after the bell.
(Reporting by Himank Sharma in Bangalore; Editing by Saumyadeb Chakrabarty)
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Related Keywords:US , WESTERNDIGITAL , RESULTS
