SanDisk Shares Fall 3.2% Amid Memory Chip Pullback After Stock's 630% Surge In 2026 This Week Ahead Of Q1

MILPITAS, Calif. — Shares of SanDisk Corp. fell $56.93, or 3.23%, to $1,707.24 as of 10:33 a.m. ET Thursday, retreating alongside a broader pullback across memory chip stocks following one of the most dramatic single-stock rallies of the year across the entire S&P 500.

Thursday's decline came as fellow memory makers Micron and SK Hynix also traded lower in premarket and morning activity, according to TipRanks, with the sector giving back some of its recent gains following a sharp rally earlier in the week. SanDisk shares remain up an extraordinary amount for the year, having surged more than 630% in 2026, according to Yahoo Finance, driven by a combination of surging AI-related demand for NAND flash memory and a series of major long-term supply contracts.

SanDisk emerged as the top-performing stock in the S&P 500 during the first half of 2026, according to Forbes, with shares climbing 726% over that stretch, more than twice the gain posted by second-place finisher Micron, which rose 266% over the same period. The rally has been driven by SanDisk's position as a key beneficiary of the broader AI infrastructure buildout, given that its enterprise solid-state drives, which use NAND flash memory, are increasingly relied upon to store the massive datasets required for AI computing workloads.

The company reported strong fiscal fourth-quarter 2026 results on Aug. 5, with non-GAAP earnings per share of $39.25, beating analyst estimates by 13.47%, and revenue of $8.97 billion, topping forecasts by 6.53%, according to Investing.com. Despite the beat, shares fell 12.1% after hours following the report, reflecting investor focus on forward guidance and margin sustainability rather than the headline results alone. SanDisk's data center revenue surged 103% sequentially to $2.98 billion during the quarter, driven directly by AI-related demand, while non-GAAP gross margin reached 84.6%, up sharply from 26.4% a year earlier.

Looking ahead, SanDisk guided for first-quarter fiscal 2027 revenue of between $10.3 billion and $10.8 billion, with earnings per share projected in a range of $44 to $46. The company also disclosed that it has signed 10 new business agreements worth a combined minimum of $93.9 billion, providing more than four years of revenue visibility, according to Investing.com's summary of the earnings call. Management indicated it expects long-term supply agreements to account for more than 50% of the company's total bit shipments in fiscal 2027, reflecting a strategic shift toward more predictable, contracted revenue streams within a historically cyclical industry. The company's consumer segment, by contrast, declined 32% to $556 million during the quarter, underscoring the extent to which SanDisk's growth has become concentrated in AI-driven enterprise and data center demand rather than traditional consumer storage products.

SanDisk has continued raising capital expenditure to expand production of its next-generation BiCS8 and BiCS10 NAND flash technology, with management projecting the broader NAND market will reach $500 billion by 2027. The company also has $15.5 billion remaining in its share buyback authorization following $4.5 billion in repurchases during the fourth quarter alone, according to Investing.com.

Despite its remarkable year-to-date performance, SanDisk shares have pulled back significantly from their 52-week high of $2,354.39, reached on June 22, according to Forbes. The stock has retreated more than 30% from that peak, falling roughly 20% during a recent monthly stretch alone, a decline Forbes attributed in part to institutional profit-taking following the stock's parabolic first-half rally, along with some capital rotation toward SK Hynix following that company's recent Nasdaq listing.

Wall Street analyst sentiment toward SanDisk has remained broadly positive despite the recent pullback. According to Google Finance, 14 of 16 analysts covering the stock rate it a "buy" or "strong buy," with an average 12-month price target of $2,145, implying more than 21% upside from Thursday's trading level. Citi analyst Asiya Merchant has maintained a Buy rating on the stock with a $2,100 price target, according to Robinhood. Other analysts have set price targets as high as $3,600, according to Investing.com, reflecting a wide range of expectations for how the stock might perform as the AI-driven memory boom continues to unfold.

SanDisk is also set to join the S&P 100 index later this month, alongside Dell, Palo Alto Networks and Arista Networks, according to TipRanks, a development that followed the stock's 11.9% surge on Sept. 4 when the index inclusion was first announced. That kind of major index inclusion often drives additional institutional buying demand, as funds tracking the S&P 100 are required to add shares of newly included companies to their portfolios.

Founded in 1988 and headquartered in Milpitas, California, SanDisk develops, manufactures and sells data storage devices and solutions based on NAND flash technology, including solid-state drives, memory cards and USB flash drives, serving customers across computer manufacturing, data centers, cloud service providers and retail markets globally. The company's current corporate structure traces back to a 2024 incorporation, following its earlier history as part of Western Digital before its spinoff as an independent public company.

With SanDisk's next earnings report scheduled for Nov. 5, investors are likely to continue watching closely for further signals on the sustainability of the company's current gross margin levels, continued execution on its long-term supply agreements, and broader trends across the memory chip sector following Thursday's pullback. The key question for investors, according to Forbes' recent analysis, remains whether the stock's ongoing retreat from its June highs represents a healthy pause within a longer-term uptrend tied to durable AI infrastructure demand, or the beginning of a more sustained correction following one of the most dramatic single-stock rallies the broader market has seen in recent years.