Key Highlights

  • Sandisk fell 13.47% to $1,150.89 on October 30, 2026.
  • The drop followed record results, an eight-for-one Stock Split and slowing NAND price gains.
  • Fiscal first-quarter Revenue reached $11.03 billion, up 378% from a year earlier.
  • Split-adjusted trading is expected to begin on November 20.

What looked like a victory lap turned into a punishing, high-volume session for Sandisk (NASDAQ:SNDK). The flash memory maker reported record results on Thursday evening, beat Wall Street's forecasts on revenue and profit, raised its outlook above expectations and announced an eight-for-one stock split. On Friday, October 30, the shares fell 13.47% to close at $1,150.89, down from $1,330.05 the previous evening. Volume reached 17.42 million shares, about 2.15 times the normal level, making Sandisk one of the most actively traded US stocks by dollar value.

The selling had three overlapping causes: a slowdown in the pace of NAND price increases, a warning from Japanese memory maker Kioxia that pointed in the same direction, and a broad semiconductor rout triggered by the 28.58% collapse of Intel (NASDAQ:INTC) after its own disappointing outlook. Coming after a run that had lifted the stock roughly 460% this year through Thursday, according to market reports, the combination proved enough to send investors toward the exits.

A beat that was not enough

For its fiscal first quarter of 2027, which ended October 2, Sandisk reported revenue of $11.03 billion, up 23% from the prior quarter and 378% from a year earlier. Consensus had been about $10.7 billion, and the company's own guidance range was $10.3 billion to $10.8 billion, according to market reports. Adjusted Earnings Per Share came in at $49.51, against estimates that various surveys put between about $46.67 and $47.15. GAAP diluted EPS was $52.60. Gross Margin was 85.0% on a GAAP basis, compared with 29.8% a year earlier, according to market analysis.

The mix tells the story of the AI build-out. Datacenter revenue jumped 61% sequentially to $4.80 billion, about 44% of the total. The Edge segment, which covers storage for PCs and phones, grew 7% to $5.83 billion. Consumer revenue, which includes retail cards and drives, fell 29% to $397 million, a sign that elevated prices are starting to hurt volumes at the retail end of the market.

Guidance for the December quarter calls for revenue of $12.2 billion to $12.6 billion, non-GAAP gross margin of 84.5% to 85.5% and adjusted EPS of $55 to $57 on a pre-split basis. Market Analysis said the midpoint was above Wall Street's expectations. The company also returned $5.0 billion through Buybacks during the quarter, retiring about 3.2 million shares.

The stock initially rose nearly 3% in after-hours trading on Thursday. The mood changed overnight.

The pricing question

The key detail for investors was the source of growth. Sequential revenue growth slowed to 23% from 51% in the prior quarter. Higher prices drove about 40% of the sequential increase, down from roughly two-thirds the quarter before, with higher volumes accounting for the remaining 60%. Chief financial officer Luis Visoso said he expects modest further price increases in the second quarter and through fiscal 2027.

Then came Kioxia, which operates flash Manufacturing joint ventures with Sandisk in Japan. According to market reports, Kioxia forecast operating profit of about 2 trillion yen for the current quarter, below analyst estimates of 2.35 trillion yen, implying nearly flat quarter-on-quarter pricing. Its NAND average selling price rose in the mid-20% range in the September quarter, down sharply from a 70% increase in the prior three months. Market reports described the update as a sign that the surge in NAND prices may be ending.

Morningstar (NASDAQ:MORN) cut its Fair Value estimate for Sandisk to $870 from $1,000, saying NAND pricing growth is slowing "earlier and faster than the firm had anticipated." It expects memory makers to add capacity between 2027 and 2029 and doubted that long-term customer agreements would fully protect suppliers if market prices fell sharply. RBC Capital trimmed its price target to $1,400 from $1,600, citing doubts about returns on AI infrastructure spending, according to market reports.

A sector-wide sell-off

Sandisk was not falling alone. Intel's weak fourth-quarter guidance sparked what market reports described as a 7% plunge in the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index, while the Nasdaq Composite fell 2.86%. Memory peer Micron (NASDAQ:MU) fell 5.30%, and AMD (NASDAQ:AMD) dropped 10.88%. Investors broadly questioned whether AI Demand justifies current chip valuations and the scale of hyperscaler capital spending.

What Sandisk does

Sandisk was spun out of Western Digital (NASDAQ:WDC) in February 2025 and designs and sells NAND flash memory and solid-state storage. It joined the S&P 500 in November 2025 and the Nasdaq-100 on April 20, 2026. The stock's transformation from a consumer memory card Brand into an AI infrastructure supplier has come through enterprise SSDs used to store the vast data sets that AI models train on and serve.

Valuation

Even after Friday's drop, Sandisk carries a market Capitalization of about $166 billion and trades at roughly 15.8 times trailing earnings. That compares with about 11.9 times for Micron, the closest US-listed memory peer. On forward numbers, the multiple looks lower still if the December-quarter guidance is met. Morningstar's fair value of $870 sits about 24% below Friday's close, while the average analyst target cited in market reports is about $2,104. The stock remains far below its 52-week high of $2,354.39.

The bull case

Supporters point to datacenter growth that shows no sign of stalling, margins of about 85% that would have seemed impossible a year ago, and long-term agreements with large cloud customers. Management is buying back stock aggressively, retiring about 6.0 million shares, roughly 4% of the count, over two quarters. If AI storage demand keeps rising, the current multiple may prove modest.

The bear case

Skeptics see a classic memory cycle near its peak. Pricing contributed less to growth this quarter, Kioxia signals flattening prices, and new capacity is expected later in the decade. Market analysis also noted that receivables grew about 40% in one quarter and that adjusted free Cash Flow rose less than revenue, while the diluted share count was still about 3% higher than a year ago despite buybacks. Weak consumer volumes suggest high prices are already curbing demand.

Stock Split and Price Data Ahead

The split takes effect for holders of record on November 9, with split-adjusted trading expected to begin November 20, when the share price will be roughly one-eighth of its current level. Beyond that, investors will watch monthly NAND contract price data, Kioxia and Samsung commentary, and hyperscaler capital spending plans for signs of whether the pricing slowdown turns into an outright decline. December-quarter results, expected early next year, will show whether the guided $12.4 billion midpoint and 85% margin hold.