Everforth, Inc. (ASGN): what the price assumes

boothcheck covers Everforth, Inc. (ASGN) but does not put one priced-in number on it: here the defensible answer is the evidence rather than a point estimate. boothcheck publishes no house fair value, target price, or buy/sell rating. Narrative composed 2026-07-25.

Generated: 2026-09-07 · Exported: 2026-09-09 · Source: https://boothcheck.com/report/ASGN

Headline

What The Price Assumes (Inversion)

The assumption today's price embeds, recovered by inverting the valuation.

The operating-margin figure is value-band context at year 12: derived from the framework's value band, a separate calculation — not part of the priced-in solve.

The price sits below what even a 5%/yr operating-profit decline would warrant; the inversion reports a bound, not a solved growth path.

Solve inputs: computed at a 7% cost of capital with 4% terminal growth over a 5-year stage.

How unusual the bet is: within-range (limited comparison data)

Valuation X-Ray

Asset, earnings-power and peer-multiple models all land far below the price; ONLY the growth-DCF reaches it. The bet is durable compounding the static frames structurally cannot price (a moat/durability premium).

How the valuation models price the stock relative to the market price. Price/FV above 1.0 means the market pays more than that lens defends (expensive); at or below 1.0 the lens can defend the price.

Families that justify the price: Growth Families that call it expensive: Asset, Earnings

The models below discount at their own flat-beta convention rates (cost of equity 9.3%, WACC 4.8%); the inversion above states its own rate.

Per-Model Detail (n=12)

Economic-Unit Decomposition (Sum Of The Parts)

One or more material disclosed units has unresolved economics. Unknown/general is not evidence of homogeneity: segment SOTP is primary but incomplete, consolidated cash flow may remain only a secondary cross-check when every unit shares an enterprise basis, and one sector multiple or target margin is withheld.

No total common-equity value is stated. One or more material units lack a supported unit value. The displayed values are an indicative subtotal; consolidated debt and cash cannot be applied to a fraction of the company.

Solvency

Bullet Takeaways

• Consulting work now accounts for 62% of revenue against 38% for the traditional staffing assignments the company was built on, and the filing is explicit about why that shift is being pushed: the larger total addressable market in IT consulting offers us greater revenue and margin opportunity.
• The clearest threat is not a competitor but a customer, and the 10-K names it directly: our own clients may develop their own internal AI-related capabilities, which could lead to reduced demand for our services or solutions, which for a business that sells billable hours is the whole thesis in one sentence.
• Net debt of 1.301 billion dollars against trailing operating income of $201.8 million leaves roughly 6.5 times operating profit of borrowings on a business whose revenue fell 2.9% in fiscal 2025, and the second-quarter report due July 29, 2026 is the next real read on whether the decline has stopped.

Bull Case

Staffing and consulting firms are among the easiest businesses in the market to misread, because the top line is not what it looks like. When Everforth reports $4.0 billion of revenue, most of that figure is the cost of the people doing the work, billed through to the client at a markup. The company keeps the spread. That is why a 5.1% operating margin here does not mean the same thing it would at a software company, and why comparing this business to the market on a price-to-sales basis produces a number with almost no information in it. The lens that works is the multiple applied to operating profit, and on that basis the market is currently paying about 11 times what the whole company earns before interest and tax.

For a business with a rising consulting mix, that is a low number. The mix shift is real and it is measurable: the 10-K reports that commercial consulting revenues were $1.3 billion, up 14.4 percent year-over-year, while the older assignment business, which totaled $1.5 billion (37.7 percent of total revenue, is the part being managed rather than grown. Management states the reasoning plainly: the larger total addressable market in IT consulting offers us greater revenue and margin opportunity. Consulting engagements are longer, priced on outcomes more than on hours, and harder for a client to switch away from mid-project. Staffing assignments end when the assignment ends.

The federal business supplies something the commercial side does not, which is visibility. The 10-K discloses contract backlog of $2.9 billion as of December 31, 2025, which represents the estimated amount of future revenues to be recognized under awarded contracts including task orders and options, against a federal segment that produced $1.2 billion of revenue that year. More than two years of awarded work sits on the books before a single new contract is won. Most of it runs on time-and-materials terms, which the filing describes as fixed hourly rates for each direct labor hour expended and reimbursements for allowable material costs, an arrangement that transfers scope risk to the customer rather than to the contractor.

Where the business sits against its cohort explains why the multiple is where it is, and also why it might not stay there. CTSH converts 15.8% of revenue into operating profit and EXLS 15.2%, both consulting-led. At the other end, RHI converts 1.4% and MAN converts 0.8%, both staffing-led. Everforth's 5.1% sits between them, which is exactly where a company two thirds of the way through a transition from one model to the other should sit. Every point of margin it moves toward the consulting group is worth a great deal on a base this size.

Meanwhile management has been buying the stock rather than issuing it. The share count has fallen about 5.7% a year over the four years to March 2026. Accounting equity per share is $43.22, a figure that includes goodwill carried from past acquisitions but is real enough as a claim on the business. Repurchases struck well below it concentrate the remaining owners' interest in both the earnings and the balance sheet, and buybacks are the one form of capital allocation that cannot be faked in a press release. The fair objection is that the money spent on buybacks is money not spent reducing borrowings. The counter is that the company is not burning cash, covers its interest bill three times over from operating income, and generated $290.6 million of free cash flow on a trailing basis, which is enough to do both.

Bear Case

The uncomfortable question for a business that sells expertise by the hour is what happens when the expertise gets cheaper to produce. Everforth's own annual filing does not dodge it, and the sentence is worth reading twice: our own clients may develop their own internal AI-related capabilities, which could lead to reduced demand for our services or solutions. The filing goes on to name the mirror-image risk, that if the expected value of AI does not materialize at scale, or if high-profile AI failures emerge, the current wave of client spending reverses. Both roads lead to fewer billable hours. A company whose product is people-time has no obvious hedge against a technology whose selling point is needing less of it.

That is not a distant hypothetical, because the revenue line is already going the wrong way. Fiscal 2025 revenues were $4.0 billion, down 2.9 percent year-over-year, and the federal segment, which are all consulting revenues, were $1.2 billion, down 3.3 percent year-over-year mainly related to the loss of certain contracts as a result of initiatives associated with DOGE. Government procurement reform is not over just because one initiative ended. KBR's own 10-K makes the point for the whole sector: Although DOGE was disbanded in November 2025, we cannot rule out the possibility of similar initiatives occurring in the future. The federal book supplies the backlog visibility, and the federal book is where the contracts were lost.

Then the capital structure, which is where a shrinking revenue line stops being an inconvenience and starts being a problem. Net debt of 1.301 billion dollars sits against trailing operating income of $201.8 million, which is roughly 6.5 times operating profit. Liquid assets on hand come to 161.2 million dollars. The borrowings are real and dated: the latest quarterly filing discloses that the balances due at maturity will be $90.0 million for term loan A and $466.3 million for term loan B, alongside a $500.0 million revolving credit facility and unsecured senior notes. Operating income covers the interest bill three times over, which is adequate rather than comfortable, and adequate coverage is a function of today's operating income rather than a permanent property of the company.

The buyback deserves the same scrutiny. Reducing the share count 5.7% a year is genuinely accretive when the shares are cheap, and it is also a decision to carry the borrowings rather than retire them. Management is effectively borrowing against a declining revenue base to concentrate ownership of it. That trade works if the decline stops. If the consulting transition stalls while the assignment business keeps shrinking, the leverage stays where it is while the operating income that services it does not.

The most honest version of the bear case is not that this business is expensive. Nothing in the standard toolkit says it is. It is that the quote already sits below the level a decline of five percent a year in operating profit would justify, which means the market is not mistaking this for a growth company. It is pricing something worse than a slow fade, and the burden falls on the buyer to explain why that judgment is wrong.

Valuation

Start with what the price refuses to assume. Rather than embedding a growth rate, the current quote of $19.40 sits below the level that even a decline of five percent a year in company-wide operating profit would warrant. That is a bound rather than a solved figure, and it is unusual: most prices in this market require something good to happen, while this one requires something bad to happen more slowly than the market expects.

Underneath it, the company-wide multiple is about 11 times operating income, and the operating margin consistent with the current quote is roughly 3.8% over a long horizon against the 5.1% the business earns today. The bet is therefore backwards from the usual shape. A buyer is not underwriting margin expansion; they are being compensated in advance for margin erosion of a little over a point, sustained. Everything in the consulting mix shift argues against that erosion, and everything in the assignment business's decline argues for it.

The methods agree with the arithmetic more than they usually do. Earnings-power approaches, peer-multiple approaches and forward-growth approaches all land above where the shares trade. The free-cash-flow lens is the plainest of them: 290.6 million dollars of trailing free cash flow, capitalized at the required return with no growth assumed at all, produces a figure well above the current quote, and even after subtracting stock compensation the result still clears it. The exit-multiple cash-flow method reaches a similar place by holding today's operating multiple flat rather than expanding it. There is no method in the standard set that has to reach for optimism to get to today's quote.

Against the cohort, the useful comparison is not sales but what fraction of sales survives to operating profit. CTSH converts 15.8% of revenue into operating profit, EXLS 15.2%, KFY 12.8% and EPAM 9.7%, all consulting-led firms. RHI converts 1.4% and MAN 0.8%, both staffing-led, and both with revenue moving the wrong way; RHI's trailing revenue fell 6.1%. Everforth's 5.1% conversion places it in the middle of a very wide band, and the width of that band is precisely why the sector trades across such a wide range of multiples. The market has grouped this company nearer the staffing end.

The balance sheet is what keeps this from being a simple value case. Net debt of 1.301 billion dollars against 201.8 million dollars of trailing operating income is roughly 6.5 times operating profit, with 161.2 million dollars of liquid assets on hand and interest covered three times over from operating income. The company is not burning cash, and the share count has fallen about 5.7% a year over the last four years, so the capital being generated is going to owners and lenders rather than into the business. That combination, a cheap multiple carried on real borrowings, is the whole reason the methods and the market disagree: the methods value the operating profit, and the market is discounting the durability of it.

Catalysts

Two things changed the company's identity this spring. In March 2026 it closed the acquisition of Quinnox, a digital solutions provider, for $290 million in cash. Then on April 24, 2026 it completed a corporate rebrand, changing its name to Everforth, Inc. and moving to the NYSE ticker EFOR, with the federal business renamed Everforth ECS. The rebrand is cosmetic in itself. What it signals is not: the company is presenting itself as a technology and digital engineering firm rather than as a staffing agency, which is the same argument the consulting mix shift makes in the numbers.

The March quarter was soft. First-quarter 2026 revenue came to $968.3 million, essentially flat against the prior year, while profitability compressed as operating costs rose. Management guided second-quarter 2026 revenue to a range of $970.0 million to $1,000.0 million, which at the midpoint implies the top line has stopped falling without yet beginning to grow. For a business whose revenue declined 2.9% across fiscal 2025, flat is the interim objective.

The second-quarter report is due July 29, 2026, and it is the first print that carries Quinnox for a full quarter. Three things in it matter more than the headline. Whether commercial consulting held its double-digit growth rate; whether the federal segment's contract backlog rebuilt after the contract losses of the prior year; and whether the operating margin moved toward the consulting cohort or stayed where it is. The last of those is the one the price is most sensitive to.

Peer Cohorts (Per Segment, With Filing Citations)

Commercial (reported)

• RHI (Robert Half Inc.)
• FY2025 10-K: …continue making lease payments. For further information, see Note F-"Leases" to the Company's Consolidated Financial Statements included under Part II-Item 8 of this report. Purchase Obligations. As of December 31, 2025, the Company's contractual purchase obligations were $221 million, primarily related to software…
• FY2025 10-K: By-Laws of Robert Half Inc., incorporated by reference to Exhibit 3.2 to Registrant's Current Report on Form 10-Q dated May 2, 2024. 4.1 Description of Securities Registered Pursuant to Section 12 of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. *10.1 Form of Power of Attorney and Indemnification Agreement, incorporated by…
• MAN (ManpowerGroup Inc.)
• FY2025 10-K: Corporate expenses $ ( 153.7 ) Goodwill impairment charges ( 55.1 ) Intangible asset amortization expense (c) ( 34.6 ) Operating profit 255.8 Interest and other expenses, net ( 49.9 ) Earnings before income taxes $ 205.9 (a) The United States revenues above represent revenues from our company-owned branches and…
• FY2025 10-K: Corporate expenses $ ( 146.1 ) Intangible asset amortization expense (c) ( 32.7 ) Operating profit 306.0 Interest and other expenses, net ( 49.2 ) Earnings before income taxes $ 256.8 (a) The United St ates revenues above represent revenues from our company-owned branches and franchise fees received from our franchise…
• KFY (KORN FERRY)
• FY2025 10-K: CURITIES EXCHANGE ACT OF 1934 For the transition period from __to ___ Commission File Number 001-14505 KORN FERRY (Exact Name of Registrant as Specified in its Charter) Delaware 95-2623879 (State or Other Jurisdiction of Incorporation or Organization) (I.R.S. Employer Identification No.) 1900 Avenue of the Stars ,…
• FY2025 10-K: …form of Long-Term Disability Insurance Policy), filed as Exhibit 10.5 to the Company's Registration Statement on Form S-1 (No. 333-61697), filed September 4, 1998. 10.5*+ Form of U.S. and International Enhanced Executive Benefit and Wealth Accumulation Plan, filed as Exhibit 10.6 to the Company's Registration…
• EXLS (EXLSERVICE HOLDINGS, INC.)
• FY2025 10-K: …exls:HistoricalVolatilitiesMonteCarloSimulationModelPerformanceRestrictedStockUnitsMember 2025-01-01 2025-12-31 0001297989 exls:AmendmentAndRestatementOfThe2006OmnibusAwardPlan2015PlanMember exls:RiskFreeInterestRateMonteCarloSimulationModelPerformanceRestrictedStockUnitsMember 2025-01-01 2025-12-31 0001297989…
• FY2025 10-K: …2025-12-31 0001297989 exls:InternationalGrowthMarketsMember 2025-12-31 0001297989 us-gaap:CustomerRelationshipsMember 2025-12-31 0001297989 us-gaap:CustomerRelationshipsMember 2024-12-31 0001297989 us-gaap:DevelopedTechnologyRightsMember 2025-12-31 0001297989 us-gaap:DevelopedTechnologyRightsMember 2024-12-31…
• CTSH (COGNIZANT TECHNOLOGY SOLUTIONS CORPORATION)
• FY2025 10-K: …ctsh:FinancialServicesMember 2025-01-01 2025-12-31 0001058290 us-gaap:TimeAndMaterialsContractMember ctsh:ProductsandResourcesMember 2025-01-01 2025-12-31 0001058290 us-gaap:TimeAndMaterialsContractMember ctsh:CommunicationsMediaandTechnologyMember 2025-01-01 2025-12-31 0001058290…
• FY2025 10-K: 224; Letter Agreement with each of Steven Rohleder and Sandra Wijnberg regarding grant of dividend equivalents on previously issued Deferred Stock Units 10-Q 000-24429 10.8 8/3/2023 10.27† Retirement, Death and Disability Policy 10-Q 000-24429 10.1 7/30/2020 10.28† Cognizant Technology Solutions Corporation Senior…
• EPAM (EPAM SYSTEMS, INC.)
• FY2025 10-K: 7 3,206,168 Selling, general and administrative expenses 369,055 267,032 636,087 Depreciation and amortization expense 40,009 20,076 60,085 Segment operating profit: $ 541,424 $ 284,176 $ 825,600 Unallocated costs: Stock-based compensation expense ( 167,297 ) Amortization of purchased intangibles ( 29,475 ) Other…
• FY2025 10-K: …the Company's reportable segments (Note 19 "Segment Information") for the years ended December 31, 2025, 2024 and 2023: Year Ended December 31, 2025 Reportable Segments Americas Europe Consolidated Revenues Industry Verticals Financial Services $ 603,711 $ 712,776 $ 1,316,487 Consumer Goods, Retail & Travel 479,934…
• DXC (DXC Technology Co)
• FY2025 10-K: …Amendment to the Receivables Purchase Agreement dated as of September 1, 2022, among DXC Receivables LLC (f/k/a CSC Receivables LLC), as Seller, DXC Technology Company, as Servicer, PNC Bank, National Association, as Administrative Agent, and the persons from time to time party thereto as Purchasers and Group Agents…
• FY2025 10-K: CSC Receivables LLC), as Seller, DXC Technology Company, as Servicer, PNC Bank, National Association, as Administrative Agent, and the persons from time to time party thereto as Purchasers and Group Agents (incorporated by reference to Exhibit 10.2 to DXC Technology Company's Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the…

Federal Government (reported)

• CACI (CACI International Inc)
• FY2025 10-K: …could result in our inability to compete directly for prime contracts. Our federal government contracts may be terminated by the government at any time and may contain other provisions permitting the government not to continue with contract performance, and if lost contracts are not replaced, our operating results…
• FY2025 10-K: …would be materially and adversely affected. The federal government is our primary customer, with revenues from federal government contracts, either as a prime contractor or a subcontractor, accounting for 95.7% and 95.1% of our total revenues in fiscal 2025 and 2024, respectively. Specifically, we generated 75.4% and…
• LDOS (Leidos Holdings, Inc.)
• FY2025 10-K: …to be entitled to, based on the assessment of the contract specific variable fee criteria, complexity of work and related risks, extent of customer discretion, amount of variable consideration received historically and the potential of significant reversal of revenue. Contracts with the U.S. government are subject to…
• FY2025 10-K: …to which we contribute and receive expert knowledge, could be diminished. If any of the foregoing occurs, the amount of business with the U.S. government and other customers could decrease, and our business, future revenues, financial condition, and growth prospects could be adversely affected. A decline in the U.S.…
• SAIC (Science Applications International Corporation)
• FY2025 10-K: …It uses a highly automated, cloud-hosted tool set to rapidly build, test and deploy solutions and works with customers to enhance solutions going forward. Costs associated with corporate functions that are not allocable to the reportable segments are presented as Corporate. See Note 16-Business Segments Information…
• FY2025 10-K: …types of services for particular customers. OCI arises when we engage in activities that may make us unable to render impartial assistance or advice to the U.S. government, impair our objectivity in performing contract work, or provide us with an unfair competitive advantage. Existing OCI, and any OCI that may…
• BAH (BOOZ ALLEN HAMILTON HOLDING CORPORATION)
• FY2025 10-K: …• claim rights in solutions, systems, and technology produced by us, appropriate such work-product for their continued use without continuing to contract for our services and disclose such work-product to third parties, including other U.S. government agencies and our competitors, which could harm our competitive…
• FY2025 10-K: S. government's budget process, including as a result of a failure to raise the debt ceiling, could result in a reduction in our backlog and have a material adverse effect on our revenue and operating results. On March 15, 2025, the President signed into law the Full-Year Continuing Appropriations and Extensions Act,…
• PSN (Parsons Corporation)
• FY2025 10-K: …and cash flows would be adversely affected. The U.S. federal government and its agencies, including the military and intelligence community, collectively are our largest customer. In particular, it represents substantially all of the revenue of our Federal Solutions segment. Approximately 19% and 23% of accounts…
• FY2025 10-K: …before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) contribution of 46% and 54%, respectively, for the year ended December 31, 2025 ("fiscal 2025"). See "Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations-Segment Results" for further discussion on our segments. Federal…
• KBR (KBR, Inc.)
• FY2025 10-K: …or our failure to compete effectively may result in fewer orders, reduced revenue and margins and loss of market share. Our U.S. government contract work is regularly reviewed and audited by the U.S. government, U.S. government auditors and others, and these reviews can lead to withholding or delay of payments to us,…
• FY2025 10-K: …federal government processes and reduce expenditures. Although DOGE was disbanded in November 2025, we cannot rule out the possibility of similar initiatives occurring in the future. Further, on April 15, 2025, Executive Order 14275, "Restoring Common Sense to Federal Procurement," was signed, directing major…

Methodology Note

• Priced-in inversion: the valuation is inverted on the current price to recover the operating-income growth, duration, and steady-state margin the price embeds (ROE for financials, FFO growth for REITs).
• Valuation x-ray: the valuation models, grouped into four families (asset, earnings, relative, growth). Each model is expressed as a price/FV ratio (distance from price), not a point fair-value estimate. The spread across families is the disagreement.
• Economic-unit decomposition (SOTP): each disclosed business unit is assigned its native valuation basis before any multiple is applied. Operating units are valued on enterprise value; funded financial units are valued on their own common equity, because their borrowings fund earning assets rather than levering the parent. A company total is stated only once every material unit carries a supported value and the parent capital bridge reconciles.
• Solvency: net cash/debt, net-debt-to-NOPAT, interest coverage, and share-count CAGR from EDGAR financials (net debt / FFO and fixed-charge coverage for REITs; regulatory-capital framing for financials).
• Peer cohorts: per-segment comparables with deep-linkable SEC filing citations.

Fundamentals sourced from SEC EDGAR filings. Current price from Databento. The priced-in inversion and valuation x-ray are computed by the boothcheck engine; narrative composed by AI from the structured data.