Hello and welcome to the 2020 Annual Stockholders Meeting for Overstock.com. Please note that today's meeting is being recorded. It is now my pleasure to turn today's meeting over to Alisson Abraham, Chairwoman of the Board of Directors for Overstock.com. Ms. Abraham, the floor is yours.
Thank you. Good afternoon. I'm Alisson Abraham, Chairwoman of the Board of Directors of Overstock.com. At the request of our CEO, Jonathan Johnson, and the Board of Directors, I will serve as the Chair of today's meeting, which we are conducting in accordance with Regulation FD. On behalf of the Board of Directors and the management of Overstock.com, I welcome you to the 2020 Annual Meeting of Stockholders of Overstock.com, Inc. We appreciate your attendance at today's virtual meeting. Given the public health impact of the coronavirus outbreak and to support the health and well-being of our employees, shareholders, and our community, we've decided to conduct our annual meeting in a virtual-only format. We thank our shareholders for their understanding and flexibility during this challenging time.
It is now 1:00 P.M. on May 12, 2020, and in accordance with the notice of the meeting, I will call the annual meeting of the stockholders to order, and I declare the polls open for the matters to be voted on by the company shareholders at today's virtual meeting. For those of you viewing our live virtual meeting today, on the screen is an agenda for the meeting we will follow. As noted in the agenda, we will provide an opportunity for questions and discussion after the meeting has been formally adjourned. Although we will not address questions until the end of the meeting, we are taking questions now and encourage you to type your questions in early. You can submit questions through the live virtual portal by clicking on the message icon. First, I'd like to introduce our Board of Directors. Their pictures are on the screen.
Jonathan Johnson. Jonathan is our Chief Executive Officer and member of the Board of Directors since 2013. Next, Clay Corbus. Clay is an independent director and a member of the audit committee. He's been a director since 2007. Joseph Tabacco, Jr. Joe is an independent director. He is the Chair of the Nominating and Corporate Governance Committee and the Compensation Committee. He is also a member of the audit committee. Joe has been a director since 2007. Robert Shapiro. Rob is an independent director. He became director in February of this year. And as I mentioned, my name is Alisson Abraham. I've been a director since 2002, and I'm the Chair of the audit committee and a member of the Compensation Committee and the Nominating and Corporate Governance Committee. Now I'd like to introduce our executive team. So on the screen is our Overstock executive team.
Next, on the screen, we have our Medici Ventures team. And finally, on the screen, we have our team from tZERO. We have an excellent team of executives in place. Also with us today, we have the following: Eric Denning of KPMG, the company's independent auditor. If questions arise during the discussion period, our auditor should appropriately address. Mr. Denning will respond. Doug Ives, who is an Assistant Vice President with our transfer agent, Computershare, and he is serving as Inspector of Elections. Mr. Ives has taken the oath of Inspector of Elections prior to this meeting. Glen Nickle, our General Counsel and Corporate Secretary, who is serving as Secretary at this meeting.
He will now provide a caution about forward-looking statements that may be made during the meeting, and then we'll provide a report on the mailing of the notice at this meeting and the presence of a quorum. Glen.
Thank you, Alison. As we share information today to help you better understand our business, it is important to note that we may make statements in the course of this meeting that state our intentions, hopes, beliefs, expectations, or predictions of the future. These and all other statements, except for statements of historical fact, constitute forward-looking statements for purposes of the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Overstock.com's actual results could differ materially from those projected in any forward-looking statements that may be made. We disclaim any intention or obligation to revise any forward-looking statements except as required by law. Additional information concerning factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those contemplated by our forward-looking statements is contained in documents we file with the SEC, including, but not limited to, our most recent reports on Form 10-K, 10-Q, and 8-K.
In particular, please refer to the risk factors described in our Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2019, which was filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on March 13, 2020, in our Form 10-Q for the quarter ended March 31, 2020, which was filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on May 7, 2020, and in our subsequent filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. We are holding this meeting pursuant to the notice of the meeting dated March 31, 2020, which was distributed to shareholders on or about April 1, 2020, and pursuant to the amended notice dated April 27, 2020, and distributed to shareholders on or about April 28, 2020, notifying shareholders that the meeting will be held virtually rather than in person in light of the health and safety concerns presented by COVID-19.
A copy of an Affidavit of Distribution will be included with the minutes of this meeting. All shareholders of record at the close of business on March 20, 2020, are entitled to vote at this meeting. A list of shareholders entitled to vote has been available at Overstock.com's headquarters for more than the past 10 days and is available at this meeting for examination by any shareholder through the online virtual meeting portal. We will file all documents concerning the call, the notice of the meeting, and the amended notice of the meeting with the records of the meeting. The count of shares present immediately prior to the commencement of the meeting indicated that 31,845,120 shares of the company's voting shares were present in person or by proxy.
This is about 77.95% of the total outstanding voting shares of the company as of the record date, which exceeds the percentage required to establish a quorum.
Thank you, Glen. I declare a quorum present at this meeting and that this meeting is duly convened. The Board of Directors thanks all shareholders who returned their proxies. Shareholders who returned their proxies authorize the person named in the proxy card to vote on all proposals coming before this meeting. Shareholders are also able to vote their shares during this virtual meeting through the live virtual meeting portal in accordance with voting instructions we provided in the amended notice we sent to shareholders and the press release we issued on April 27, 2020. We will now turn to the proposals. These will be voted on. Joe?
Thank you, Alison. Proposal number one, the election of directors. The first matter for shareholder action is Proposal number one, the election of Alisson H. Abraham. The Nominating and Corporate Governance Committee, with Alisson H. Abraham abstaining, nominated Alison for election as a director of Overstock.com to serve for a term expiring on the date of the 2023 annual meeting of Overstock.com until a successor is duly elected and qualified. The board has endorsed the committee's recommendation, and I am pleased to present the nomination and move for the re-election of Alisson Abraham to the Board of Directors. Is there a second on the motion?
I second the proposal.
Thank you, Rob. With no other nominations coming before the shareholders in accordance with the company's bylaws, I declare the nominations closed. I suggest that those shareholders voting through the online virtual meeting portal vote now. We will count the votes after we've completed all matters on the agenda. The second matter to be submitted to the shareholders for action is Proposal number two, the ratification of the appointment by the audit committee of the Board of Directors of KPMG LLP as the company's independent registered public accounting firm for the year ending December 31, 2020. I'd like to call on Clay Corbus as a member of the audit committee for the recommendation of the audit committee and the Board of Directors in this regard. Clay?
Thank you, Alison. The audit committee has the responsibility for selecting the auditors for the company. The audit committee has unanimously selected KPMG LLP as the company's independent registered public accounting firm for 2020. I move for the ratification of the appointment of KPMG LLP as the company's independent registered public accounting firm for 2020, as described in the proxy statement.
Thank you, Clay. You've heard the motion. Is there a second?
I second the proposal.
Thank you, Rob. I suggest those shareholders voting on the online virtual meeting portal now vote. The third matter to be submitted to the shareholders for action is Proposal number three, the non-binding advisory vote to approve the compensation paid by the company to its named executive officers, the Say-on-Pay vote. I would like to call on Joe Tabacco as a member of the Compensation Committee for the recommendation of the Compensation Committee and the Board of Directors in this regard. Joe?
Thank you, Alison. The Compensation Committee has the responsibility for approving compensation paid by the company to its named executive officers. The Compensation Committee has unanimously approved the compensation paid by the company to its named executive officers as disclosed in our 2020 Notice of the Annual Meeting and Proxy Statement. I move for our shareholders to approve through a non-binding advisory vote the compensation paid by the company to the named executive officers as disclosed in our 2020 Notice of Annual Meeting and Proxy Statement.
Thank you, Joe. You have heard the motion. Is there a second?
This is Clay Corbus. I second the proposal.
Thank you, Clay. I suggest those shareholders voting in the online virtual meeting portal now vote. The fourth matter to be submitted to the shareholders for action is Proposal number four, to approve an amendment to our amended and restated 2005 Equity Incentive Plan to, among other things, increase the number of shares of common stock reserved for the issuance by 1,300,000 shares. I would like to call on Rob Shapiro for the recommendation of the Board of Directors in this regard. Rob?
Thank you, Alison. Our Board of Directors unanimously approved the amendment to our amended and restated 2005 Equity Incentive Plan on March 27, 2020, subject to the further approval of our shareholders at this meeting. I move for our shareholders to approve the amendment to the company's amended and restated 2005 Equity Incentive Plan as described in the Proxy Statement.
Thank you, Rob. You've heard the motion. Is there a second?
This is Clay Corbus again. I second the proposal.
Thank you, Clay. I suggest those shareholders voting in the online virtual meeting portal now vote. There being no further voting to be done, I declare the polls closed. I will now ask that the secretary of the meeting report on the preliminary results of the voting. Glen?
The inspector of elections has provided a preliminary tabulation of votes, and based on the preliminary tabulation and reports, we confirm on a preliminary basis as follows. First, the holders of a plurality of the voting shares represented at this meeting have voted for the election of Alisson H. Abraham, as named in the proxy statement, for a term expiring on the date of the annual meeting in 2023 or until her successor is duly elected and qualified. Second, the holders of a majority of the voting shares of the company represented at this meeting and voting on the matter, which shares voting affirmatively also constitute at least a majority of the required quorum, have voted in favor of the ratification of the appointment of KPMG LLP as the company's independent registered public accounting firm for the fiscal year ending December 31, 2020.
Third, the holders of a plurality of the voting shares represented at this meeting have voted through a non-binding advisory vote to approve the compensation paid by the company to its named executive officers, the Say-on-pay vote, as detailed in our proxy statement. Fourth, the holders of a plurality of voting shares represented at this meeting have voted for the amendment to our amended and restated 2005 Equity Incentive Plan to, among other things, increase the number of shares of common stock reserved for issuance by 1.3 million shares.
Thank you, Glen. Subject to the final tabulation of the votes, I declare that the shareholders of Overstock.com have duly elected the nominee for director, me, Alisson H. Abraham, named in the proxy statement. On behalf of the entire board, I would like to thank the shareholders for their support. I am pleased to announce that the shareholders have duly ratified the appointment of KPMG LLP as the company's independent registered public accounting firm for the fiscal year ending December 31, 2020. I am also pleased to announce that the shareholders have, through a non-binding advisory vote, voted to approve the compensation paid by the company to its named executive officers, the Say-on-Pay vote, as detailed in our proxy statement.
Finally, I'm also pleased to announce that the shareholders have voted to approve the amendment to our amended and restated 2005 Equity Incentive Plan to, among other things, increase the number of shares of common stock reserved for the issuance by 1,300,000 shares. On behalf of the entire board, I want to thank our shareholders for their support. We will provide the final results of the vote in the form of an 8-K, which we will file with the SEC within four business days. There being no other official business, this concludes the 2020 annual meeting of our shareholders. Again, I want to thank the shareholders who attended our virtual meeting, and this meeting is now adjourned. We are now at the part of our agenda providing for a discussion about the current state of our business as well as the question-and-answer period.
If you have any questions you would like answered during today's meeting, please type them in. And now I'd like to turn this over to our CEO, Jonathan Johnson. Jonathan?
Thank you, Alison. It's nice to be addressing our shareholders and others interested in Overstock again. We've got about 10 slides we'll go over. I'll first discuss the impact of COVID-19 on the Overstock Retail business. Then I'll discuss the focus, priorities, and progress of Overstock Retail , tZERO, and some of the Medici Ventures blockchain companies, and I'll finish with an update on our upcoming dividend and then take questions. I'll start with the impact of COVID-19 and how we view the shifting paradigm in which we now live and operate. Overstock, as a company, was well-positioned for and has generally been operating well in this environment. We did a company-wide trial run of work from home in early March to make sure our systems and processes could function seamlessly.
Other than at Overstock's retail's three distribution centers where crews work socially distanced and in shifts, we are now 100% work from home. There have been minimal disruptions to our business due to working from home. We haven't had to make any layoffs. Instead, we're hiring, particularly in customer care, to keep up with increased sales. Our business model couldn't be better suited to operate in the current environment. Overstock Retail' s quarter-to-date sales are up significantly, over 130% year-over-year. Our model scales so effectively and cost-efficiently because of our focus on technology and automation embedded in our systems. Our principal offerings, home furnishings, are increasingly in demand. Home goods are one of the most relevant categories under the current stay-at-home mandates. Because we are a pure-play e-commerce retailer, customers can buy what they need from us from the safety of their homes.
In our 20+ years of long-standing partner and supplier relationships and our dropship model, it allowed us to be nimble and to diversify our geographic and sourcing risks. And our proposition is particularly attractive during uncertain financial times. We offer great products at great prices. Slide 11. The retail industry landscape is shifting significantly and in our favor. Industry-wide, retail sales declined by nearly 9% in March, with estimates that they will decline by 30% due to the pandemic. Traditional brick-and-mortar retail sales are estimated to decline by 50% as consumers shift to buying online. E-commerce sales are estimated to benefit from this shift, growing by an additional 25%-30% beyond original estimates before the pandemic hit. Needless to say, these are meaningful shifts as consumers become increasingly comfortable and accustomed to making purchases online.
These forces combine to advance us several years forward in terms of online penetration. The sizable shift from brick-and-mortar to online in the home furnishings market has gone from 23% last year to an estimated 42% now. This is nearly double the amount of home goods being bought online versus in physical stores, a radical jump compared to the slower 2% annual progression over the past 10 years. While the percentages are not likely to stay this high when businesses begin opening back up and shoppers eventually become comfortable going to stores, we don't expect it to go back to pre-pandemic levels. Some of this change in online buying habits will stick. Slide 12. The impact of these market dynamics on the Overstock Retail performance has been meaningful. This chart shows sales growth as compared to the year-ago comparable periods.
We have intentionally segmented the time periods to show organic operational improvements versus what I'll call stay-at-home mandate-related tailwinds. As you can see from the chart, we were already performing significantly better in the first quarter as compared to last year. We were already on track to outperform our first-quarter plan before stay-at-home mandates began. From March 13th through the 31st, our sales grew in our signature categories as people began to focus on making their homes more functional during the stay-at-home mandate. The top category of area rugs grew 20%. We saw over 100% growth in office furniture, outdoor play equipment, swing sets, and exercise equipment. Since the stay-at-home mandate reached the entire country by April 1st, we've seen accelerated growth in home furnishings as people have shifted their shopping behavior from brick-and-mortar to online in response to the current restrictions.
As a result, year-over-year sales in the quarter-to-date period are now up over 130%. It's really important to reiterate we were already demonstrating strong performance before the stay-at-home mandate hit. I sometimes fancy myself a cyclist, so bear with my cycling analogy. When I ride my bike with a tailwind, I go faster. But when my legs are also strong, I go even faster and can catch those ahead of me. At Overstock Retail , our operational legs have become stronger through focus and execution. The point is that we were already performing well. We had strong operational legs, and the customer habits, tailwind that we're now experiencing simply allows us to go even faster. Slide 13. We've seen a meaningful increase in new customers this year, particularly in the second quarter. You can see the new customer growth during Q2 to date increased by 260% versus the year-ago period.
These new customers demographically mirror our existing customer base. Our brand values and value proposition resonate with them, evidenced by demand being almost entirely for home furnishings, things like area rugs, office furniture, patio, beds, and other home-related items. These are our bread-and-butter products, and these are exactly what people are buying. As a percentage of sales, home goods now represent over 89% of the total. Given what they're buying, we don't believe these new customers are just one-time customers. Overstock Retail is well-positioned to capture and convert the shifting online home furnishings traffic. We're providing products people need and enabling them to buy from the safety of their homes. Slide 14. Even though our focus and business model made us uniquely suited to help solve customer problems at this time, the reality is we have faced challenges over the past several weeks.
Surging sales have pushed us beyond our capacity to handle all customer care needs. While customer service requests as a percentage of sales have decreased, the absolute volume of requests has gone up. We've responded by hiring, streamlining our customer service channels, and launching automation initiatives. That said, we are still taking too long to respond to customers who are reaching out, sometimes taking a week or more. We had to turn off our phones for a few weeks, as did most businesses, but we're pleased it was only temporary, and our phones are back on. We hope hiring hundreds of more agents over the past several weeks will return us to our normal standards and responses. Fulfillment has also lagged as we and our partners adjust to working with crews working in shifts under social distancing mandates, and carriers are maxed out.
There's a high demand for packages and limited crews to manage the volume, which has caused tracking to decline, frustrating partners and customers. Going forward, there is a lot of uncertainty. There's no precedent for what we're experiencing. We don't know exactly what we'll face in terms of longer-term challenges. Broader economic indicators will certainly affect us, things like consumer spending, factory output, and pricing pressures. Unemployment is high. Partners may face capital constraints. Carriers may reduce delivery volumes or shut down altogether. We could be deemed non-essential or otherwise become subject to some sort of government shutdown, and the state of capital markets may affect our company's ability to raise capital and/or generate revenue. To recap, we don't know what we don't know. While we certainly are susceptible to a number of market-wide risk factors, on balance, I think Overstock can and will react well to shifting conditions.
Slide 15. Overstock Retail is focused on executing against this strategy with the goal of achieving sustainable, profitable growth. We're specifically focused on the initiatives that support our three brand pillars. For product findability, we continue to enhance our mobile website, including speed improvements in user experience. We're leveraging analytics to refine our machine learning models for improved site search relevancy and implementing new tools to improve content. For smart value, we are focused on clarifying our promotional price messaging, transforming our promotional model, and continuing to reduce logistics cost. And for easy delivery and support, we continue to optimize our machine learning delivery models, position inventory for fastest delivery, and improve our customer support self-service experience through platform optimization. We have differentiated ourselves from our competitors by offering free shipping on everything in the continental United States to our customers during this unique and challenging time. Slide 16.
tZERO has three overarching priorities this year. First, list more assets on the tZERO ATS. Second, enhance liquidity on the tZERO ATS. And third, improve the overall investor experience on tZERO's platform. In terms of assets, tZERO is in discussions with a growing number of prospective issuers interested in raising capital and trading on the tZERO ATS. These 200+ issuers are diverse in nature and spanned industries, including real estate, financial products, technology, and sports. While tZERO has seen some COVID-19-related delays, conversations continue, and tZERO expects activity to resume once market volatility subsides. In terms of liquidity, the upcoming Overstock Series A-1 Preferred Stock dividend should serve as a catalyst for greater platform adoption and improved liquidity longer term. And in terms of investor experience, tZERO recently improved the investor onboarding process to allow for bulk and auto-approval of new accounts.
tZERO has created a newer, more efficient onboarding experience for prospective broker-dealers, effectively removing as much of the friction as possible and accessing the tZERO ATS. tZERO remains focused on these priorities and continues to execute against its strategy. Slide 17. Most of our Medici Ventures blockchain companies continue to operate as usual. Some even stand to benefit as the problems they're helping to solve using blockchain technology are issues exacerbated by the pandemic. The pandemic has created a sense of urgency to find solutions. Solutions our companies are already in the process of developing: self-sovereign identity and health records, the ability to have a blockchain-based immunity passport that proves you either have antibodies or have been vaccinated, have become an important problem to solve. Evernym and Vital Chain are both working on developing this solution. Voting.
Having a safe and secure mobile voting solution has never been more important than right now. Even if we can't vote in person in November, no one really wants to stand in line to touch a machine the rest of the neighborhood has touched. Voatz has had recent successes in conducting elections on its mobile app and is seeing increased interest in its solution. So has Votem. Supply chain tracking and monitoring, particularly of food and medical supplies, is top of mind as we struggle with shortages and delays. GrainChain has made broad progress with development of its platform, now using Symbiont's Assembly blockchain in attracting new participants into its network, and digital currency. Paper money is germ-laden and hard for governments to distribute. It is actively working with the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank to develop a central bank digital currency and other digital currency solutions.
We're pleased our blockchain companies are working to solve the very real problems society is facing, problems exacerbated and highlighted by the pandemic, which blockchain technology can alleviate. Slide 18. I know our shareholders care about our upcoming dividend. Since the beginning of the year, the board has declared the dividend. We received DTC eligibility. Nasdaq granted us an Ex-date . We've completed the registration process, and we've passed the record date. We now look forward to distributing the dividend next week on May 19th. As a reminder, this dividend is not a cryptocurrency. It's a preferred share of stock. And let me reiterate the value of the dividend. First, there is simply its face value. Shares of OSTKO trade on the tZERO platform and are worth the open market trading price. Yesterday, OSTKO traded and closed at $16 per share.
Second, shares of OSTKO are preferred shares and pay a cash dividend. They have each of the last three years since issuance. Third, distribution of OSTKO shares to all record-based shareholders should increase participation on the tZERO platform as investors seek to buy and sell shares and broker-dealers seek to execute trades on behalf of their clients. This increased participation in platform adoption may increase the overall value of tZERO, which, as a majority 80% owner, ultimately benefits Overstock and its shareholders. I should mention that we believe liquidity in OSTKO may be thin right out of the gate as it could take time to get all four million shares on the platform and for the ecosystem to fully develop. There may also be selling pressure at first as a few index funds may need to liquidate. But longer term, liquidity will improve and participation will increase.
Remember, you do not need to sell your OSTKO shares. You can hold them indefinitely and receive the cash dividend paid. Slide 19. During our fourth quarter earnings call, I mentioned our focus on righting our ship. We had identified specific company initiatives, distractions to eliminate, and objectives and key results against which we could measure our progress. We've now righted the ship, and we are executing. This ship is sailing, even in today's choppy waters. We are resilient, and we are well-positioned to achieve Overstock Retail 's goal of sustainable, profitable growth. Let me remind you that Overstock is, at its core, a technology company. We're cutting edge in retail. We're leading the charge in blockchain technology. Technology is our core. It is enabling us to respond well to shifting tides. Because of our focus and our technology foundation, this ship is sailing.
In summary, we've made a lot of progress thus far in 2020 across all our businesses. We're executing on our initiatives. Our performance began accelerating even before the stay-at-home mandate. We are riding with that tailwind, but stronger than ever. Confident Overstock Retail will achieve its goal of sustainable, profitable growth in short order and that our blockchain businesses will continue to make real progress and gain traction. I'm optimistic. I'm as optimistic as ever about our company and its prospects. Thank you for your continued ownership and support. And with that, let's take some questions from our shareholders. Alexis? Thanks, Jonathan. We have received several questions. The first is, can you please provide an update on the ongoing SEC investigations, including specific status, and does Overstock have sufficient cash to pay any fines that may result? Yeah, I can answer that question. It's a little loaded at the end.
But the answer is this: we are a market leader in blockchain technology. Being on the cutting edge sometimes invites scrutiny, and that includes regulatory scrutiny. We have done things the right way, and we continue to engage with and cooperate with the SEC's review. We've given them unlimited access within the bounds of the law to what they've requested, and we remain optimistic that regulators, once they're satisfied with their review, will ultimately agree with us that their investigation can end. Thanks, Jonathan. Next question. As a shareholder who lives in Alaska, I'd like to request that you consider offering free shipping to Alaska. I recently purchased thousands of dollars' worth of furniture from a local store but would have happily purchased from Overstock instead, which had a much better deal. Is this on the table? Dave, can you answer that question? Sure. Happy to, Jonathan.
We frequently view Alaska as a potential opportunity. We have a limited assortment that we provide to our customers from Alaska, but as you can imagine, the costs associated with shipping are pretty extreme, and as we continue to execute to our strategy that Jonathan has mentioned throughout this call today of sustainable, profitable growth, it just doesn't provide an ROI for us based on the number of folks there, but we continue to review it. We continue to look for opportunities there. As we expand our footprint out to Canada, perhaps at one point we'll be able to include that in our free shipping over $45 assumptions, but for now, it's just not something that returns an ROI that makes sense for us, and hopefully, you can appreciate that as a shareholder, well, we'd love your business. Thanks, Dave. Another question for retail.
The question is, are you hiring new customer care people who will be able to work 100% from home even after the lockdowns end? Dave, you want to address that one? Sure. Happy to. We had customer service agents working 100% from home prior to this work-from-home mandate. And I think what we've realized is how productive our team can be. And as we move forward, I'm fairly confident we'll be hiring even more as a percentage of total that will be working from home 100% of the time. But we'll get through this process. We're still working on reentry plans. So until then, everyone's working from home. And please come to Overstock Careers and sign on. We're hiring. Let me thank you, Dave. Let me also just address that.
One of the things that we've seen, I think that the world has seen on work from home is how important personal connections and interactions are to our collective psyche. Our teams have done a really nice job working from home. They've been productive, and we really haven't slipped a stitch in too many places. When it's time for reentry, and we're in no hurry to be in the vanguard of reentry, we'll be thoughtful about who works from home, how much they can work from home, and what the right cadence is on that. We have seen a lot of benefits from working from home, and we've also seen everyone's gotten really used to virtual meetings, and we've gained new skills at sharing screens and doing all kinds of things that not all of us could do before.
But there is a benefit in the personal connections and interactions that come from working together. Thanks, Dave and Jonathan. A couple of questions related to the dividend. The first is, I hold some of my OSTKO shares in an IRA at Schwab. How can I buy more OSTKO in my IRA? Well, that's a good question. I'm not sure of all the IRA purchasing rules. Glen Nickle, can you address that question? You bet. We are working on that proposal to allow that. It also depends on your specific broker. But we expect to have that capability and are working a way to have that ready to go. Thanks, Glenn. Related to the dividend as well, can you please clarify what you mean by, "Preferential rights to dividends when declared on the preferred Series A1 shares"? Sure.
So, when dividends are declared and the company has board of directors that declare dividends for the Series A shares each of the last three years. But when dividends are declared, they first go to preferred holders of the preferred Series A-1 shares and the Series B shares, which are for overseas holders. So the company I don't think is in the place of declaring a dividend for its common stock. We've got ways we can spend that money and grow it. But we have committed, at least in the past, we've paid a dividend on the preferred shares. So when we do pay a dividend, it goes to the preferred shareholders first.
Thanks, Jonathan. I'm showing no further questions in the queue.
Okay. Well, let me close by saying this: we thank all of you for owning Overstock, for entrusting management to build your capital for you.
Later this month or perhaps early June, we're still working on a date that fits everyone's schedule. We will hold a virtual Investors Day meeting. So look for details for that in the coming days. And until we talk again, stay safe and stay healthy, and we'll stay busy. Thanks.
And this concludes the informal part of our meeting. We again thank all of our shareholders for attending today's virtual meeting. Thank you very much.
Thank you. This concludes the 2020 Annual Stockholders Meeting for Overstock.com. You may now disconnect.