First Advantage (NYSE:FA) Sees Unusually-High Trading Volume – Time to Buy?

First Advantage Co. (NYSE:FA) saw strong trading volume on Thursday . 1,919,062 shares traded hands during trading, an increase of 326% from the previous session’s volume of 450,478 shares.The stock last traded at $18.22 and had previously closed at $18.70.

Analyst Ratings Changes

FA has been the subject of a number of recent research reports. Truist Financial reduced their price objective on shares of First Advantage from $250.00 to $249.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, July 22nd. Wolfe Research lowered First Advantage from an “outperform” rating to a “peer perform” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 10th. Finally, Citigroup lifted their target price on First Advantage from $19.00 to $21.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Wednesday, September 25th. Three analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have assigned a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, First Advantage presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $77.25.

First Advantage Stock Down 3.1 %

The company has a 50 day moving average of $19.30 and a 200-day moving average of $17.43. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.61, a current ratio of 4.31 and a quick ratio of 4.31. The company has a market cap of $2.63 billion, a P/E ratio of 115.94 and a beta of 1.16.

First Advantage (NYSE:FA) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, August 8th. The company reported $0.21 EPS for the quarter, hitting the consensus estimate of $0.21. First Advantage had a return on equity of 13.94% and a net margin of 3.24%. The company had revenue of $184.55 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $184.66 million. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $0.24 earnings per share. First Advantage’s revenue was down .4% on a year-over-year basis. On average, equities analysts predict that First Advantage Co. will post 0.82 earnings per share for the current year.

Institutional Trading of First Advantage

Several hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the business. Capital Research Global Investors boosted its holdings in First Advantage by 9.4% during the 1st quarter. Capital Research Global Investors now owns 5,777,481 shares of the company’s stock valued at $93,711,000 after acquiring an additional 496,898 shares during the period. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP boosted its stake in shares of First Advantage by 8.8% during the second quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 3,131,188 shares of the company’s stock valued at $50,314,000 after purchasing an additional 254,219 shares during the period. Boston Partners grew its holdings in shares of First Advantage by 155.3% in the first quarter. Boston Partners now owns 1,713,935 shares of the company’s stock worth $27,841,000 after purchasing an additional 1,042,473 shares during the last quarter. Emerald Advisers LLC increased its stake in shares of First Advantage by 2.1% in the third quarter. Emerald Advisers LLC now owns 1,183,050 shares of the company’s stock worth $23,484,000 after buying an additional 24,217 shares during the period. Finally, Fred Alger Management LLC bought a new stake in First Advantage during the 2nd quarter valued at $12,906,000. 94.91% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

About First Advantage

First Advantage Corporation provides employment background screening, identity, and verification solutions worldwide. It offers pre-onboarding products and solutions, such as criminal background checks, drug/health screening, extended workforce screening, FBI channeling, identity checks and biometric fraud mitigation tools, education/work history verification, driver records and compliance, healthcare credentials, executive screening, and other screening products.