TacticScaleWhat First Advantage Does & How It Makes Money (FA)
Updated October 2026 · reflects First Advantage's latest reported financials
Employment background screening, identity, and verification services provider. It sells background screening, verification, and monitoring products to employers and organizations, which pay for checks run on job candidates, employees, and extended workforce.
How First Advantage makes money
It sells background screening, verification, and monitoring products to employers and organizations, which pay for checks run on job candidates, employees, and extended workforce. It also earns revenue from adjacent services such as fleet compliance, hiring tax credit programs, and investigative research.
What First Advantage does
First Advantage Corporation, based in Atlanta, Georgia and founded in 2002, provides employment background screening, digital identity, and verification solutions internationally. Its pre-onboarding offerings include criminal background checks, drug/health screening, extended workforce screening, FBI channeling, identity checks and biometric fraud mitigation, education/work history verification, driver records, healthcare credentials, and executive screening. After hiring, the company provides post-onboarding monitoring such as criminal records monitoring, I-9 verification, healthcare sanctions, motor vehicle records, social media screening, and global sanctions and licenses. Adjacent products include fleet/vehicle compliance, hiring tax credits and incentives, and investigative research. Buyers include HR, talent acquisition, risk, compliance, vendor management, and safety teams at enterprises, mid-sized firms, and small companies. The company was formerly known as Fastball Intermediate, Inc. and adopted its current name in March 2021.
Products & services
- Criminal background checks
- Drug and health screening
- Identity checks and biometric fraud mitigation
- Education and work history verification
- I-9 verification
- Criminal records and motor vehicle records monitoring
What is First Advantage worth?
On an owner-earnings DCF, First Advantage's most-likely value is about $17 versus a recent price near $19 (12% above fair value). But TacticScale only calls a stock undervalued when the price sits below its conservative no-growth floor (~$10) with a margin of safety — so the honest verdict here is “Fairly priced — no edge.” Fair value earns its keep only at the extremes, not in the wide middle.
Price sits in the normal range — fair value isn't actionable here; it earns its keep only when price drops below the no-growth floor, or runs to roughly double the optimistic case.
⚠ High leverage — net debt is 9.2× annual cash flow. Net debt is subtracted from this fair value, but refinancing at higher rates, principal timing, and share dilution aren’t modeled — the equity can be worth far less if cash flow weakens.
Analysis, not advice. Fair value is a margin-of-safety estimate from a deterministic owner-earnings DCF, not a price target or recommendation. See the full breakdown →
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