Susquehanna analyst, Mehdi Hosseini, noted that Western Digital (NASDAQ: WDC) positively pre-announced Jun Q Revenue of $3.46B (vs. guidance of $3.4B) and EPS of $0.72 (vs. guidance of $0.68). Additionally, WDC announced the departure of CFO Olivier Leonetti, who will be replaced by Mark Long (Chief Strategy Officer).

The analyst believes the ~$60M Jun Q Revenue upside is driven by HDD TAM upside since his Asia work seemed to suggest some moderation of decline in PCs. WDC guided Jun Q TAM to 95M units, and if we attribute the entirety of WDC's beat to HDD TAM, then that would imply a TAM upside in the ~97M-98M range (1M unit upside, at ~43% market share).

Moreover, encouraging NAND pricing trends could support 2H results, but could be partially offset by strength in the Yen.

Incoming CFO Mark Long will have big shoes to fill as CFO Leonetti has done an impressive job steering the company through the HGST integration and SanDisk acquisition process.

No change to Positive rating or price target of $80.00

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Shares of Western Digital Corp. closed at $45.46 yesterday.