Sandisk stock has already climbed more than 5x in 2026, and Bernstein says the rally may not be finished. The firm said last month that Sndk stock could soar to $3,000, arguing that booming demand for NAND flash chips and sustained pricing gains could keep driving the shares higher.
That call landed alongside numbers that help explain why the stock has been so strong. Sandisk was trading at 50 times earnings, yet its adjusted earnings in the first nine months of fiscal 2026, which ended on April 3, jumped 11.5x from a year earlier to $31.32 per share. The company also guided to $31.50 per share for the current quarter, a figure that points to a sharp acceleration in growth and puts it on track to end fiscal 2026 with $62.82 per share based on the midpoint of that guidance. Sandisk reported earnings of $2.99 per share in fiscal 2025.
The numbers matter because Sandisk is being treated by investors as an AI beneficiary, not just a memory-chip maker. Global data generation is expected to more than double to 2.4 zettabytes in 2028 from 1.1 zettabytes in 2024, driven mainly by AI, and that surge is pushing storage buyers away from older options. Traditional hard disk drives were already sold out for 2026, while hyperscalers have been turning to flash-based storage products such as solid-state drives. Bernstein's Mark Newman said that mix of booming NAND demand and higher prices should act as a tailwind for Sandisk.
The valuation debate is the catch. Sandisk is trading at 22 times forward earnings, a multiple that looks rich next to many chipmakers but still sits above the Nasdaq Composite's price-to-earnings ratio of 43 noted in the broader market comparison. If Sandisk eventually reached $182.89 in earnings per share and the stock kept a 22 times forward earnings multiple, the shares would hit $4,023, a level that shows just how much growth bulls are pricing in. McKinsey has estimated that the enterprise SSD market could grow at an annual rate of 35% through 2030 in a base-case scenario, giving the flash-storage market another layer of support.
For now, Sandisk remains a stock where earnings momentum and investor optimism are moving in step. The question is whether the company can keep delivering growth fast enough to justify a valuation that already assumes a long runway.
