8. ESOP

The ESOP trust acquired 3,024,574 shares (6,846,728 shares post-corporate reorganization) of common stock in the Company's initial public offering and 4,726,000 shares of common stock in the Company's corporate reorganization in December of 2010. Both acquisitions of common stock were made with proceeds from loans from the Company. The loans are secured by shares of the Company's stock purchased in each offering. The Bank has agreed to make cash contributions to the ESOP trust on an annual basis sufficient to enable the ESOP trust to make the required annual loan payments to the Company on September 30 of each year. The loan for the shares acquired in the initial public offering matured on September 30, 2013. The loan for the shares acquired in the corporate reorganization matures on September 30, 2040.

As annual loan payments are made on September 30, shares are released from collateral and allocated to qualified employees based on the proportion of their qualifying compensation to total qualifying compensation. On September 30, 2014, 165,198 shares were released from collateral. On September 30, 2015, 165,198 shares will be released from collateral. As ESOP shares are committed to be released from collateral, the Company records compensation expense. Dividends on unallocated ESOP shares are applied to the debt service payments of the loan secured by the unallocated shares. Dividends on unallocated ESOP shares in excess of the debt service payment are recorded as compensation expense and distributed to participants or participants' ESOP accounts. Compensation expense related to the ESOP was $3.8 million for the year ended September 30, 2014, $9.7 million for the year ended September 30, 2013, and $6.7 million for the year ended September 30, 2012. Of these amounts, $362 thousand, $3.7 million, and $3.4 million related to the difference between the market price of the Company's stock when the shares were acquired by the ESOP trust and the average market price of the Company's stock during the years ended September 30, 2014, 2013, and 2012, respectively. The amount included in compensation expense for dividends on unallocated ESOP shares in excess of the debt service payments was $1.7 million, $3.0 million, and $325 thousand for the years ended September 30, 2014, 2013, and 2012, respectively, which was related to the loan for the shares acquired in the corporate reorganization.

Shares may be withdrawn from the ESOP trust due to retirement, termination, or death of the participant. Additionally, a participant may begin to diversify at least 25% of their ESOP shares at age 50. The following is a summary of shares held in the ESOP trust as of September 30, 2014 and 2013:



	2014		2013
	(Dollars in thousands)
Allocated ESOP shares	4,923,349		4,892,642
Unreleased ESOP shares	4,295,148		4,460,346
Total ESOP shares	9,218,497		9,352,988

Fair value of unreleased ESOP shares	$	50,769	$	55,442