Western Digital Posts Profit and Several Billions of Revenue for 2012

While Advanced Micro Devices reached a revenue of $5.42 billion / 4.08 billion, it actually incurred a large monetary loss in the fourth quarter of 2012, and 2012 as a whole. What we see now is a company that actually accumulated a profit during the December quarter.

The sum of $3.8 billion is definitely large (2.85 billion Euro), considering that it was raised during only three months.

Indeed, WD gathered it from 59.2 million HDD shipments during the December 2012 quarter, which also happens to be the second quarter (Q2) of its fiscal year 2013. The profit was of $335 million / 251.65 million Euro.

All things considered, it is easy enough to see why WD would be satisfied with the numbers. Like Seagate, the corporation has more than profited from the 200-300% HDD price increase following the 2011 Thai floods.

Clearly, prices continue to be on the high side even over one year later.

"We are pleased with our December quarter results, reflecting outstanding execution and value creation by our HGST and WD teams," said Steve Milligan, president and chief executive officer.

"In an environment marked by continued macroeconomic uncertainty, soft PC demand and inventory rebalancing by our customers, we continue to manage our business by focusing on those variables that we control, allowing us to generate better than expected revenue and profitability and strong cash generation."

Soon, Western Digital will be ready to post its financial results for the 2012 calendar year. Seagate will too.

That said, there is little chance of HDDs becoming as cheap as they were in mid-2011, at least for the foreseeable future. The profits made by WD make it obvious that people have been buying the storage units with the same gusto as ever, despite how expensive they are, so the drive maker really has no reason to slash the prices.