Common Stock

12 Months Ended

Dec. 31, 2019

As of December 31, 2019 and December 31, 2018, the Company had 596,950 shares of common stock authorized. For a detailed description of our share-based compensation programs refer to Note 11, Employee Stock Benefit Plans.

The following table reflects the changes in the Company's common stock issued and outstanding:



For the Year Ended
(in thousands)	Issued	Treasury		Outstanding
Balance at December 31, 2016	282,318	(63,317	)	219,001
Shares issued under the 2015 Equity Incentive Plan	15,856	—		15,856
Employee taxes paid on withholding shares	—	(2,319	)	(2,319	)
Common stock repurchases	—	(1,599	)	(1,599	)
Balance at December 31, 2017	298,174	(67,235	)	230,939
Shares issued under the 2015 Equity Incentive Plan	11,562	—		11,562
Employee taxes paid on withholding shares	—	(2,758	)	(2,758	)
Balance at December 31, 2018	309,736	(69,993	)	239,743
Shares issued under the 2015 Equity Incentive Plan	5,832	—		5,832
Employee taxes paid on withholding shares	—	(2,113	)	(2,113	)
Assets acquisition	240	—		240
Common stock repurchases (Note 8)	—	(853	)	(853	)
Balance at December 31, 2019	315,808	(72,959	)	242,849

Common Stock Repurchases

On June 11, 2019, concurrently with the issuance of the Convertible Senior Notes, the Company repurchased the Company’s outstanding common stock in privately negotiated transactions. For additional information, refer to Note 8. Long-Term Debt.

We repurchased the following shares of common stock during the year ended December 31, 2019:



	December 31, 2019
Shares of common stock repurchased	852,515
Value of common stock repurchased	$	10,000

Net Operating Loss Rights Agreement

On June 7, 2012, we entered into a Tax Benefits Preservation Plan, or Preservation Plan, designed to preserve stockholder value and tax assets. Our ability to use our tax attributes to offset tax on U.S. taxable income would be substantially limited if there were an "ownership change" as defined under Section 382 of the U.S. Internal Revenue Code. In general, an ownership change would occur if one or more "5-percent shareholders," as defined under Section 382, collectively increase their ownership in us by more than 50 percent over a rolling three-year period.

In connection with the adoption of the Preservation Plan, our board of directors declared a dividend of one preferred share purchase right for each outstanding share of the Company’s common stock. The preferred share purchase rights were distributed to stockholders of record as of June 18, 2012, as well as to holders of the Company's common stock issued after that date, but will only be activated if certain triggering events under the Preservation Plan occur.

Under the Preservation Plan, preferred share purchase rights will work to impose significant dilution upon any person or group which acquires beneficial ownership of 4.9% or more of the outstanding common stock, without the approval of our board of directors, from and after June 7, 2012. Stockholders that own 4.9% or more of the outstanding common stock as of the opening of business on June 7, 2012, will not trigger the preferred share purchase rights so long as they do not (i) acquire additional shares of common stock or (ii) fall under 4.9% ownership of common stock and then re-acquire shares that in the aggregate equal 4.9% or more of the common stock.

The Preservation Plan was set to expire on June 30, 2019, unless extended by our board of directors. On June 6, 2019, at the Vonage 2019 annual meeting of stockholders, stockholders ratified the continued extension of the Preservation Plan through June 30, 2021.