Stock-Based Compensation

12 Months Ended

Dec. 31, 2016

Stock-Based Compensation

The Company has several stock-based compensation plans under which it is currently authorized to grant restricted stock and stock. As of December 31, 2016, there are 5.5 million remaining shares available to grant under these plans. The Company generally issues new shares of common stock to satisfy employee performance share awards and purchases shares on the open market for nonemployee director stock awards.

Total stock-based compensation expense (after tax) was $3.3 million, $2.9 million and $4.4 million in 2016, 2015 and 2014, respectively.

As of December 31, 2016, total remaining unrecognized compensation expense related to stock-based compensation was approximately $4.9 million (before income taxes) which will be amortized over a weighted average period of 1.5 years.

Stock awards

Nonemployee directors may receive shares of common stock instead of cash in payment for directors' fees under the nonemployee director stock compensation plan. There were 37,218 shares with a fair value of $1.1 million, 58,181 shares with a fair value of $1.1 million and 43,088 shares with a fair value of $1.1 million issued under this plan during the years ended December 31, 2016, 2015 and 2014, respectively.

Performance share awards

Since 2003, key employees of the Company have been awarded performance share awards each year. Entitlement to performance shares is based on the Company's total shareholder return over designated performance periods as measured against a selected peer group.

Target grants of performance shares outstanding at December 31, 2016, were as follows:



Grant Date	Performance Period	Target Grant of Shares
February 2014	2014-2016	136,901
February 2015	2015-2017	200,112
June 2015	2015-2017	14,441
February 2016	2016-2018	310,583
March 2016	2016-2018	2,151

Participants may earn from zero to 200 percent of the target grant of shares based on the Company's total shareholder return relative to that of the selected peer group. Compensation expense is based on the grant-date fair value as determined by Monte Carlo simulation. The blended volatility term structure ranges are comprised of 50 percent historical volatility and 50 percent implied volatility. Risk-free interest rates were based on U.S. Treasury security rates in effect as of the grant date. Assumptions used for grants of performance shares issued in 2016, 2015 and 2014 were:



				2016						2015						2014
Weighted average grant-date fair value					$14.60						$18.98						$41.13
Blended volatility range	29.25	%	–	32.51		%	22.86	%	–	24.61		%	18.94	%	–	20.43		%
Risk-free interest rate range	.47	%	–	.92		%	.05	%	–	1.07		%	.03	%	–	.74		%
Weighted average discounted dividends per share					$1.56						$1.57						$2.15

The fair value of the performance shares that vested during the years ended December 31, 2016 and 2014, was $953,000 and $16.6 million, respectively. There were no performance shares that vested in 2015.

A summary of the status of the performance share awards for the year ended December 31, 2016, was as follows:



	Number of Shares	Weighted Average Grant-Date Fair Value
Nonvested at beginning of period	565,896	$	27.90
Granted	324,205	14.60
Less:
Vested	58,401	29.01
Forfeited	167,512	27.30
Nonvested at end of period	664,188	$	21.47

- Definition

The entire disclosure for compensation-related costs for equity-based compensation, which may include disclosure of policies, compensation plan details, allocation of equity compensation, incentive distributions, equity-based arrangements to obtain goods and services, deferred compensation arrangements, employee stock ownership plan details and employee stock purchase plan details.

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