Anyone expecting Seagate Technology and Western Digital to slump after their wild rally in 2025 likely will have to wait.

The data-storage duo rose yet again Friday as Seagate's last remaining bearish analyst changed tack. Demand for the companies' hard disk drives, or HDDs, is just that strong.

Seagate stock, which is up 16% in 2026 through Thursday's close, jumped 3.3% to $331.01 in premarket trading. Western Digital, already up 29% for the year, climbed 3.6% to $230.05.

Susquehanna upgraded Seagate to Neutral from Negative and lifted its price target to $280 from $150 in a Friday research note. The firm reiterated a Neutral rating for Western Digital but bumped its price target to $205 from $135.

"We acknowledge that our earlier, more negative HDD industry thesis has proven incorrect -- particularly with respect to STX," wrote analysts led by Mehdi Hosseini.

Artificial intelligence has increased the value of data for companies and, in turn, demand for hard drives, Seagate CEO Dave Mosley told Barron's last month. That story has been a boon for investors. Seagate stock surged 219% in 2025, while Western Digital was the top performer in the S&P 500 last year, gaining 282%.

But data storage is a notoriously cyclical industry, leaving a minority of sell-side analysts wary of an eventual downturn. Hosseini was the final holdout on Seagate.

Why change course now? For one thing, demand for commercial-scale drives has turned out better than Susquehanna's initial expectations, the firm said. And Seagate's transition to its next generation of magnetic-recording technology has been "executed near-flawlessly," it said.

That migration to newer technology is forecast to increase capacity per drive by 30%, Susquehanna said. As a result, even if average selling prices decline from their current dizzying heights, unit costs should decline and profit margins should expand.

Susquehanna sees the total market for high-capacity HDDs growing at a 25% annual clip through 2028, up from a previous estimate of 20%. The next peak in shipments likely won't come until mid-2027, the firm said.

With Susquehanna's Negative rating now a memory, 71% of firms polled by FactSet rate Seagate at Buy or the equivalent. The remaining analysts rate it at Neutral.

Western Digital still has one holdout in Baptista Research, which has an Underweight rating on the stock. That stance is getting lonelier as hard- drive stocks continue their ascent.