STX · Seagate Technology Holdings
Conviction · Low · more likely to lag the S&P 500 over the next three months
Wrong if: a daily close above $699.31
Note written ·
Price against the kill line
24.5% clear of its kill line on the 13 November 2026 close.
How to read this
This note expects the shares to lag the market, so its kill line sits above the price: a close above the red mark would prove the view wrong. Prices run from low on the left to high on the right. The dot is where the stock closed on 13 November 2026, left of the mark while it is below the line; a dot right of the mark has closed through it.
The scale is stretched near the line, so close calls are easy to see. More than 8% from the line, the stock reads well clear, with a hollow dot to show the figure is off the drawn scale.
The kill line is the research note's own test. The portfolio sells on business facts, not on a price. How the portfolio decides
Three months against the kill line
Daily closes, to . Red: the kill line, a daily close above $699.31, on record since 11 November 2026. The shares are down 46.9% since the close; the S&P 500 is down 2.1% over the same sessions. Figures in the note can cover a different window.
Kill line
A daily close above $699.31, the 200-day average of adjusted closes as of 11 November 2026, which would show the shares leading the S&P 500; fiscal Q2 2027 revenue above the $4.90 billion top of the guide would also prove this call wrong.
Research onlyNot in the portfolio.
Catalyst
Key figures from the filings · Technology
Quarter to 2 October 2026, filed 29 October 2026; valuation at the 13 November 2026 close
- Revenue, latest quarter ($M)
- 4,233
- Revenue, change on a year (%)
- +61.0
- Gross margin (%)
- 57.3
- Operating margin (%)
- 48.8
- Free cash flow, four quarters ($M)
- 4,157
- Net cash, cash less debt ($M)
- −1,125
- Price to earnings (×)
- 27.6
- Enterprise value to sales (×)
- 8.9
All filed numbers
What Seagate Technology Holdings reports to the SEC in its quarterly and annual filings. Each group states its period and filing date once; a figure dated otherwise says so. Built from the filings known on .
| Quarter to | Revenue ($M) | On a year (%) | Gross margin (%) | Operating margin (%) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| first filed | 4,233 | +61.0 | 57.3 | 48.8 |
| first filed | 3,629 | +48.5 | 52.3 | 43.0 |
| first filed | 3,112 | +44.1 | 46.5 | 32.1 |
| first filed | 2,825 | +21.5 | 41.6 | 29.8 |
| first filed | 2,629 | +21.3 | 39.4 | 26.4 |
| first filed | 2,444 | +29.5 | 37.4 | 23.2 |
| Pre-tax income ($M) | 1,982 |
| Net income ($M) four quarters: 4,396 | 1,761 |
| Diluted shares, change on a year (%) against the quarter to 3 October 2025 | +2.7 |
| Operating cash flow ($M) | 4,832 |
| Capital spending ($M) | 675 |
| Free cash flow ($M) | 4,157 |
| Cash and short-term investments ($M) | 1,258 |
| Debt ($M) | 2,383 |
| Net cash, cash less debt ($M) | −1,125 |
| Deferred revenue ($M) | 182 |
| Backlog, orders not yet delivered ($M) | Not reported |
| Receivables ($M) | 1,817 |
| Inventory ($M) | 1,700 |
| Shareholders' equity ($M) | 3,453 |
| Market value ($M) | 121,275 |
| Enterprise value, market value plus net debt ($M) | 122,400 |
| Enterprise value to sales (×) | 8.9 |
| Enterprise value to operating income (×) | 22.4 |
| Price to earnings (×) | 27.6 |
| Price to book value (×) | 35.1 |
| Free-cash-flow yield (%) | 3.4 |
Short interest (FINRA, settled 15 October 2026, published 26 October 2026): 3.4% of shares outstanding sold short, 1.4 days of average trading to cover, +12.7% since the previous report.
| Window | Bought | Sold |
|---|---|---|
| 90 daysfrom | $0 | $349.3M |
| 12 monthsfrom | $0 | $585.4M |
The thesis
Seagate Technology's shares are more likely to lag the S&P 500 than lead it over the next three months. Its business is at record margins, but the shares move with AI-hardware sentiment, and that sentiment has swung sharply in both directions since 5 November 2026. Nvidia's 17 November 2026 report is the nearest test. Seagate's fiscal Q2 2027 results, estimated for late January 2027, show whether data center exabyte growth and nearline pricing can outweigh the fear that storage demand has peaked.
The shares closed at $551.72 on 11 November 2026, up $50.10 or 9.99% on the day, per Chartmill. That followed a roughly 10% gain on 9 November 2026, per TIKR. The selling of 5 November 2026 and 6 November 2026 left a close of $460.99. The 11 November 2026 close is still 40.1% lower over three months and 51.8% below the 52-week intraday high of $1,145.00 set on 18 June 2026.
The rebound came from another company's results. CoreWeave reported on 10 November 2026. Its chief executive said demand was ten times its remaining computing capacity for 2027, per Yahoo Finance and Benzinga on 11 November 2026. Seagate rose with Micron and SanDisk the next session, per 24/7 Wall St. Seagate has reported no new figures since its 27 October 2026 results and its 10-Q filed on 29 October 2026.
The rating is Low because the late rally rests on sector sentiment rather than on new Seagate numbers. The shares sit below both their 50-day and 200-day averages. The question the market sold on, whether hard-drive demand growth is slowing, gets no Seagate-specific answer before the January report. Goldman Sachs' James Schneider called AI stocks oversold on 11 November 2026 but warned that capex financing and power limits could cap a rally before year-end, per 24/7 Wall St.
The price already reflects a cyclical peak in earnings. TIKR put the forward price-to-earnings ratio at 9.8 times on the 6 November 2026 close, against a five-year average of 26.2 times. TIKR cites fiscal 2023, when revenue fell 37%, as the precedent the market is pricing.
Bullish and bearish views on Seagate Technology Holdings PLC
The bull case on Seagate Technology Holdings PLC (STX), in brief: guidance well above consensus. The bear case: exabyte growth is slowing.
Bull case
- Guidance well above consensus. On 27 October 2026, Seagate guided fiscal Q2 2027 revenue to $4.70–4.90 billion against a $4.527 billion estimate. Adjusted earnings per share (EPS) guidance was $9.00–9.40 against $8.58, per Benzinga.
- Beat on the latest quarter. Fiscal Q1 2027 revenue was $4.233 billion against a $4.138 billion estimate, and adjusted EPS was $7.68 against $7.42, per Benzinga on 27 October 2026. 24/7 Wall St. put revenue growth at 61% year over year.
- Record margins and cash. Non-GAAP gross margin reached 57.8% in fiscal Q1 2027, up from 40.1% a year earlier, and free cash flow was a record $1.5 billion, per Investing.com on 27 October 2026. TIKR reported on 9 November 2026 that gross margin has risen for seven straight quarters.
- Pricing per unit is rising fast. Revenue per exabyte shipped was $19.2 million in the quarter ended 2 October 2026, up 33% year over year, per TIKR. Long-term agreements cover the vast majority of nearline supply through calendar 2028, per 24/7 Wall St. on 11 November 2026.
- Largest AI cloud customers report shortages. CoreWeave reported a record $132.5 billion revenue backlog on 10 November 2026, up 138% year over year, and its chief executive said the company is largely sold out through 2027. Seagate's nearline drives sell into the same data-center build-out.
- Morgan Stanley calls it a top pick. Morgan Stanley's Erik Woodring kept an Overweight rating and a $1,148 target on 6 November 2026, citing a "disconnect" between strong fundamentals and weak sentiment, per TIKR. TIKR put the Street average target at $1,045 on 10 November 2026; MarketBeat's consensus target was $1,000.88 on 5 November 2026.
- Debt down, dividend up. Seagate retired $750 million of debt after quarter end, leaving gross debt at $1.6 billion, per Investing.com on 27 October 2026. It raised the quarterly dividend to $0.76 from $0.74.
Bear case
- Exabyte growth is slowing. Data center shipments were 198 exabytes in fiscal Q1 2027, up 24% year over year, per the 27 October 2026 earnings call. Morgan Stanley and Citi both said on 28 October 2026 that volume fell short of their expectations.
- Political risk reached the demand story. Benzinga tied the 5 November 2026 sell-off to midterm election results that raised fears of data-center construction delays. Seagate sells to the same data-center buyers as the memory makers.
- New supply is coming. Nikkei reported in October 2026 that Toshiba plans to double its hard-disk capacity, which TIKR called the clearest threat to pricing on 9 November 2026. TIKR also reported that Seagate's prices are set through calendar 2027 but calendar 2028 pricing is not yet agreed.
- Officers sold into the decline. Chief executive William Mosley sold 23,280 shares at an average $602.44 and 6,720 shares at an average $622.82 on 2 November 2026, per SEC Form 4 filings. Chief technology officer John Morris sold 2,675 shares at an average $650.15 on 30 October 2026. Both sales ran under Rule 10b5-1 plans.
- The rally rests on a third party. The 11 November 2026 gain followed CoreWeave's results, and CoreWeave sells computing capacity, so strong demand talk serves its own business; its call named no storage supplier.
- Trades as a sector proxy. Seagate fell 16.3% on 5 November 2026 alongside a near-20% drop in SanDisk, per MarketBeat and Benzinga, with no change to its own guidance. Sector headlines move the shares in both directions regardless of hard-drive supply.
Price setup
Quoted closes show $557.06 on 4 November 2026, $466.53 on 5 November 2026, $460.99 on 6 November 2026, $506.14 on 9 November 2026, $501.62 on 10 November 2026 and $551.72 on 11 November 2026. The 5 November 2026 volume was 9,573,104 shares, 112% above average, per MarketBeat. The 6 November 2026 close of $460.99 is the low close of the sell-off.
The 11 November 2026 close sits just under the 4 November 2026 close of $557.06, the last close before the gap down. A move back above that level would erase the 5 November 2026 fall. Above it, the 50-day average of adjusted closes stood at $751.08 on 11 November 2026, and the 200-day average sits below that.
The three-month reference close was $921.37 on 13 August 2026. The 52-week intraday high is $1,145.00 from 18 June 2026, and the 52-week closing low is $237.49 from 21 November 2025. The shares have more than doubled from that low even after the autumn fall, so the stock still carries most of its 2025–2026 gain.
Catalysts ahead
- 17 November 2026: Nvidia fiscal Q3 2027 report. Seagate has moved with AI hardware in both directions since 5 November 2026, so Nvidia's data-center outlook can move the shares regardless of hard-drive supply.
- ~17 December 2026 (est.): Micron fiscal Q1 2027 report. The next large memory print; storage shares have moved with memory results and memory-pricing news through the autumn.
- 23 December 2026: Ex-dividend date for the raised $0.76 quarterly dividend. Confirms the payout increase announced with fiscal Q1 2027 results.
- ~25 January 2027 (est.): Seagate fiscal Q2 2027 results. Tests delivery against the $4.70–4.90 billion revenue guide and shows whether data center exabyte growth re-accelerates from 24% and nearline pricing keeps rising.
What would change the view
A daily close above $699.31, the 200-day average of adjusted closes as of 11 November 2026, which would show the shares leading the S&P 500; fiscal Q2 2027 revenue above the $4.90 billion top of the guide would also prove this call wrong.
What it trades with
Seagate trades with SanDisk, Micron and Western Digital. All four rallied on 3 November 2026 on Apple's memory-pricing comments, fell together on 5 November 2026, and rose together on 11 November 2026 after CoreWeave's report, per Benzinga and 24/7 Wall St. On 9 November 2026, TIKR reported Seagate's 10% gain alongside Coherent, Vertiv, Lumentum and Astera Labs, so the shares respond to the whole AI-hardware group. Nvidia and hyperscaler spending news moves them more than hard-drive industry data does. SanDisk's 8-for-1 stock split takes effect on 19 November 2026, per 24/7 Wall St.; it changes no fundamentals but can add trading activity in the group.
The evidence, claim by claim (8)
- Seagate shares closed at $551.72 on 11 November 2026, up $50.10 or 9.99% on the day, after closing at $460.99 on 6 November 2026. Chartmill S&P 500 top movers, 11 November 2026 · as of
- Fiscal Q1 2027 revenue was $4.233 billion against a $4.138 billion estimate; adjusted EPS was $7.68 against $7.42. Benzinga, 27 October 2026 · as of
- Fiscal Q2 2027 guidance: revenue $4.70–4.90 billion against a $4.527 billion estimate; adjusted EPS $9.00–9.40 against $8.58. Benzinga, 27 October 2026 · as of
- Non-GAAP gross margin was 57.8% in fiscal Q1 2027, up from 40.1% a year earlier; free cash flow was a record $1.5 billion. Investing.com, 27 October 2026 · as of
- Data center shipments were 198 exabytes in fiscal Q1 2027, up 24% year over year. Seagate fiscal Q1 2027 earnings call, 27 October 2026 · as of
- Morgan Stanley's Erik Woodring kept an Overweight rating and a $1,148 target, citing a disconnect between strong fundamentals and weak sentiment. TIKR, 10 November 2026 · as of
- CoreWeave reported a record $132.5 billion backlog, up 138%, and its CEO said demand was ten times its remaining 2027 capacity. Yahoo Finance; Benzinga, 11 November 2026 · as of
- CEO William Mosley sold 23,280 shares at an average $602.44 and 6,720 shares at an average $622.82 on 2 November 2026 under a Rule 10b5-1 plan. SEC Form 4 filings, 3 November 2026 · as of
Sources
- Seagate Spikes 9%, Sandisk Surges 8% as CoreWeave's Results Revive AI Trade; Micron Climbs 7% · 247wallst.com ·
- Seagate Soars 10% in AI Rebound as Morgan Stanley Sees “Strong Fundamentals and Weak Sentiment” · tikr.com ·
- Seagate Dropped 15% in a Week: Morgan Stanley Says It Could Double in the Next 12 Months · tikr.com ·
- Micron, Sandisk Soar as CoreWeave CEO Says AI Demand Outpaces World's Capacity · finance.yahoo.com
- Micron, Sandisk Soar as CoreWeave Flags AI Capacity Crunch · benzinga.com
- S&P 500 Top Movers Today: Double-Digit Gainers Lead, Declines Stay Smaller · chartmill.com
- Seagate Technology (NASDAQ:STX) Shares Down 16.3% · marketbeat.com ·
- SanDisk Leads Memory Stocks Lower: A Look Inside the Rout · benzinga.com
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