NOTE 12 STOCK BASED COMPENSATION

Stock Options

The Plan allows for equity awards to be granted to employees, consultants, advisors, and directors. The Plan is administered by the Board of Directors, which determines the terms pursuant to which any award is granted. The Board of Directors may delegate to certain officers the authority to grant awards to certain employees (other than such officers), consultants and advisors. The number of shares of common stock reserved for issuance thereunder is 17.5 million shares, with no more than 1 million shares subject to grants of options to an individual in a calendar year. The plan also provides for the grant of incentive options under Section 422 of the Internal Revenue Code (the “Code”), which provide potential tax benefits to the recipients compared to non-qualified options. At December 31, 2016, 5,294,563 awards were authorized and available for issuance under the Plan.

During the year ended December 31, 2016, 1,494,085 shares of common stock were issued upon exercise of stock options under the Company’s Amended and Restated Equity Incentive Plan (“Plan”), at a weighted average exercise price of $2.51 per share for proceeds of $3.7 million. This compares to no shares of common stock issues during 2015 and 1,499,300 shares of common stock issued during 2014 upon exercise at a weighted average exercise price of $1.29 per share, for proceeds of $1.9 million.

The following table summarizes information about stock options under the Plan outstanding at December 31, 2016:


				Weighted
		Weighted		Average
		Average		Remaining
	Number of	Exercise		Contractual	Intrinsic
	Shares	Price		Life (Years)	Value
	(in thousands, except per share and year data)
Balance at December 31, 2014	4,651	$	3.35	4.4	$	—
Granted	2,733		1.03	—		—
Exercised	—		—	—		—
Forfeited	(272)		2.82	—		—
Expired	(158)		2.12	—		—
Balance at December 31, 2015	6,954	$	2.49	4.1	$	98
Granted	645		3.99	—		—
Exercised	(1,457)		2.48	—		1,601
Forfeited	(1,422)		3.45	—		—
Expired	—		—	—		—
Balance at December 31, 2016	4,720	$	2.41	3.4	$	4,388
Exercisable at December 31, 2016	2,257	$	2.74	2.9	$	1,697

Stock options have been granted to key employees, directors and consultants under the Plan. Options to purchase shares under the Plan were granted at or above market value as of the date of the grant. During the year ended December 31, 2016, the Company granted stock options to certain employees and directors for an aggregate of 0.7 million shares of common stock (2015 - 2.7 million, 2014 - 1.7 million) at a weighted average exercise price of $3.99 per share (2015 – $1.03, 2014 - $2.90). The options vest equally over a three-year period if the individuals remain affiliated with the Company (subject to acceleration of vesting in certain events) and are exercisable for a period of 5 years from the date of issue.

The fair value of the options granted under the Plan was estimated at the date of grant, using the Black-Scholes option-pricing model, with the following weighted-average assumptions:


	2016		2015		2014
Risk-free interest rate		1.13% to 1.21%		1.10% to 1.79%		1.10	%
Dividend yield		0.24% to 0.27%		0% to 1.15%		—	%
Volatility factor of the expected market price of common stock		74%		73% to 74%		70	%
Weighted-average expected life of option		5.0 years		5.0 years		3.5 years
Weighted-average grant date fair value	$	2.36	$	0.49	$	1.45

During the year ended December 31, 2016, the Company recorded stock option expense of $1.0 million (2015 -$1.3 million, 2014 - $1.3 million) while the corresponding fair value of awards vesting in the period was $1.3 million (2015 - $1.5 million and 2014 - $2.0 million). None of the stock option expense was capitalized as part of the cost of an asset or any other item on the Consolidated Balance Sheet.

At December 31, 2016, there was $1.4 million (2015 - $1.6 million, 2014 - $1.8 million) of unrecognized compensation expense related to 2.5 million (2015 - 4.2 million, 2014 - 2.7 million) unvested stock options outstanding. This cost is expected to be recognized over a weighted-average period of approximately 1.6 years (2015 - 1.6 years, 2014 – 1.6 years).

The following table summarizes the status and activity of non-vested stock options for the year ended December 31, 2016:


		Weighted
		Average
	Number of	Grant Date
	Shares	Fair Value
	(in thousands, except per share amounts)
Non-vested, beginning of year	4,182	$	0.74
Granted	645	$	2.36
Cancelled/Forfeited	(826)	$	0.77
Vested	(1,538)	$	0.85
Non-vested, end of year	2,463	$	1.08