Spin Offs Revisited

[elliots]

Mark,
Just entered a spin-off using the spin-off tool and not happy with results*. Researched forum and saw that you too were unhappy (8/9/12 response) that external transactions are generated inappropriately. You decided to let it be. I'm encouraging you to revisit this. The result creates misleading entries in the Executive Summary report. It confounds the "Contributions" and "Withdrawal totals and also shows a "Withdrawn Distribution" which is not actually withdrawn and which throws of the gain/loss calculation. There ought to be a better way.

Elliot

*Transaction was new security spun-off and remains in the same account/portfolio.

[Mark]

Hi Elliot,

I don't recall the issue. Do you have a link to the post, or can you clarify the problem?

[elliots]

The issue is that external transactions are created using the spinoff tool. You acknowledged that in the old post and indicated that you were not happy with that but that was the way it was. I'm hoping you'll reconsider fixing it because the external transactions cause errors in the Executive Summary Report.

Couldn't figure out to create a link to the old post and an effort to paste a screenshot into this post failed.

Elliot

[Mark]

Hi Elliot,

Yes, the spin-off uses transfers which will be external transactions, and the distributions in the parent are also not deposited into cash. You will get a withdrawal and a contribution of equal/opposite showing up on the Executive Summary report after a spin-off. I'm not sure of a relatively easy way to change/improve this, given how often this is a problem.