Assigning Investments Manually to Cash Account

[TonyWSAE]

I have entered a lot of investment transactions into FM and then added a cash account later (my mistake). Although I have now created a sub-portfolio which is the cash account and set the properties to point to it, I can not get any of the existing investments to see it as the cash account.

In other words, the investment values (purchases and sales) I had already entered are not being debited or credited from the cash account.

Is there any way to edit the already entered investments to get them to debit and credit to this cash account created after the investments were added to FM ?

[Mark]

Hi TonyWSAE,

Default cash account entries are only made at the time the data is entered/imported, not afterwards. You could either manually enter all the cash transactions now, or you could export all the investment transactions, and re-import. Upon re-import all the transactions can be automatically debited/credited to your default cash account.

You could use either the Generic or QIF export/import commands to accomplish this. See "File /Export / Transactions" and then "File / Import / Transactions".

[TonyWSAE]

Mark Hi,
I tried what you suggested exporting to QIF and then reimporting again but my cash balance increases when the transactions are re-imported. The process creates double entries of my transactions. When I delete the double entries I am back to where I started with a cash balance that has no debit or credits of the investment transactions.

Another thing I noticed is when entering new investments it's not always possible to get the exact actual amount paid for the shares based on the share price and number of shares. Ex. Assume some shares have a calculated value of 2,132.75 by FM but the actual price paid was 2,132.69. While I can go in and edit the investment data in the data register to show 2,132.69 as that paid for that investment, the market value shown in the portfolio editor remains unaltered at 2,132.75. In other words what ever is entered for the investment value when first created remains unaltered in the market value in the Portfolio editor. I don't know how the price reflects as a debit against the cash balance as I haven't sorted that problem out yet.

I'm only evaluating this software for possible purchase and I don't look forward to putting in all the data again for over 60 transactions just to see if it correctly calculates the cash balance which is what I wanted to check. I currently use a spreadsheet I created so I know what the balance should be.

[Mark]

Hi TonyWSAE,

Can you give me a simple example of a transaction you have recorded, for both the stock/cash side? Here is how it should work... If you buy a stock for $1,000 you should have a buy in that stock investment for $1,000 and also a sell of cash for $1,000 to pay for that. All cash transactions should be recorded at a price of $1, and the shares are equal to the value of the transaction.

Likewise, if you sell a stock for $1,000 you should have both a sell in the stock, and a buy of cash, each for $1,000. If you had a deposit of cash, this would just be a buy of cash. If you have a withdrawal of cash, this is a sell of cash. Cash is just like any other investment, where the share balance is the sum of all your prior recorded transactions. You can look at your cash transactions in the Data Register, and see what is wrong.

If you only have the stock side of all your transactions, and no cash entries, you can use this export/import technique I mentioned, but make sure you import back into a new/empty sub-portfolio, so you aren't getting duplicate transactions.

On the rounding question... You want to record the value/shares exact, and let any rounding go into the "price" field. For tips on this, see:

http://www.fundmanagersoftware.com/help ... rrors.html

Also, the price for your transactions is independent from the market price. If you record a transaction, and there is no market price recorded on that date, then FM will update the market price with your transaction price. However, if you already have a market price recorded, it will not modify it when you record a transaction. That is why your market value wasn't changing when you updated the transaction price. You can go update the market price separately. In the Data Register window, change the "Data Type" to "Prices" to view/edit the recorded market prices. When the Data Type is set to "All Transaction" you are seeing only the transactions, and not the closing prices.

[TonyWSAE]

Mark,
I have figured out why the transactions were not debited or credited to the cash investment I created. It was because I had the cash investment in a sub-folder not in the same folder as my investments. So problem solved.

My next problem is one of different currencies. I have read the manual which refers to the topic on P62 - Multiple Currency Tutorial. It says exchange rates can be applied to investments or adjusted in the investment properties dialogue.

My cash currency is GBP but my investments are in mainly USD, GBP and CHF. I set up a cash investment in GBP and the default currency in FM is USD. However for each investment when I adjust the exchange rate USD to GBP to that which applied when the stock was bought, it makes no difference to the cash remainder. FM does not appear to be converting the investment in USD into GBP and deducting that as GBP from my cash balance. It deducts the USD value from my cash balance as if the cash balance is in USD. Hope that makes sense.

I have tried fiddling around with this but can not get FM to deduct the equivalent GBP value of each investment from my GBP cash balance even when I have specified the exchange rate for each investment individually.

[Mark]

Hi TonyWSAE,

How are you doing this:

for each investment when I adjust the exchange rate USD to GBP to that which applied when the stock was bought

If you are under "Options / Currency Settings..." those are global currency and exchange rate settings, not per-investment or per-transaction rates.

Money is added/deducted from default cash based off either the global exchange rate, or the transaction specific exchange rate at the time you record the transaction. Setting the global exchange rate after recording a transaction is not going to change the amount of money that was added/deducted from cash.

If you specify a transaction specific exchange rate at the time of recording your transaction, that will be used. If you don't check this option (or it isn't available to you), then the global exchange rate at that time will be used. To record a transaction specific exchange rate, see this option in the Buy/Sell or Distribution dialog. You will only see it if the investment you're entering a transaction for is not in the default currency. So, in your case, if you track cash in GBP, you might want to make GBP your default currency. Any investment not in GBP will then give you the option to record a transaction specific exchange rate when recording transactions.

[TonyWSAE]

Mark Hi,
Under options, currency setting the default currency is set to USD. In the portfolio editor my CASH investment, right click properties is set to currency GBP.When I click on CASH in the portfolio editor - Investment data - all data, I can see all the investment transactions that are posted against CASH. If I click to edit one of the posted investments in my CASH investment I can specify the exchange rate to the default for any of the investments pre-posted. In my case as example I would specify the exchange rate as 0.59269875 for GBP to USD. For another investment the exchange rate would be different. I have tried modifying a couple of investments this way but it makes no difference to the sum deducted from the CASH balance. If I put in 1 GBP = 1USD the CASH balance remains the same.

[Mark]

Hi TonyWSAE,

You are modifying the transaction from the cash end, instead of the investment end. If you are editing a cash transaction, you are specifying the shares for that cash transaction, so it makes no difference what you put for the exchange rate. However, if you were editing the non-cash side of the transaction, and that investment is not in the default currency, you can specify the exchange rate to the default currency, and it will affect the amount of cash.

The transaction specific exchange rate requires your cash to be in the default currency. Do you want USD as your default currency? Or, would you prefer it be GBP? You can set your default currency, it doesn't have to be USD.

[TonyWSAE]

Mark,
The investment transactions were originally entered with the default currency as USD since most of the investments are in USD. But I want the amount that is deducted from my CASH investment balance fro each investment to be in GBP. So how do I do that ?

I have tried modifying the investment end by specifying an exchange rate but that doesn't seem to work either. When I pull up an individual investment in the portfolio editor to specify the exchange rate the text to the right of the input box says USD = 1$.
I am obviously doing something wrong but what ?

[Mark]

Hi TonyWSAE,

It sounds like "$" is your default currency. Note, there is another USD currency, but that is not the "default" currency. The top currency you put in the "Currency Settings..." dialog is the default currency, all other 24 are not. Since USD is meant to be the same as $ in your case, leave that exchange rate at 1, or you can change all your USD investments from USD to $.

You can't really use transaction specific exchange rates when your cash is not in the default currency. Instead, you can either record the correct exchange rate as the global exchange rate prior to recording your transaction, or you can modify the amount of cash after recording the transaction. Let's say you buy a stock for $1,000.00 and want to debit your cash for GBP 589. You can either record .589 for the GBP -> $ exchange rate as the global exchange rate for the date of your transaction, prior to recording the transaction, or you can just record the transaction for $1,000 and then go edit the cash side to be GBP 589 afterwards. If you're going to do this, you may even want to just turn off the default cash account feature, and record both halves of the transaction yourself (buy $1,000.00 of stock, sell GBP 589 of cash).

You may also like to read the documentation on this, by going to:

http://fundmanagersoftware.com/help/dlg_currency.html

[TonyWSAE]

Mark Hi,
I have tried changing the transaction values for my investments in my CASH data register for example: One entry for an investment was for 140 shares @ $14.98 fee $15 resulting in a value of $2112.19. When I go into the CASH data register and select this stock transaction to EDIT, I am presented with the buy/sell transaction pop-up with VALUE 2112.19, SHARES 2112.19. PRICE 1. If I change the PRICE multiplier to the exchange rate of 0.59862825 and click on the VALUE field it changes to 1,264.42 which is the correct amount in GBP i.e. £1,264.42. Having done that and clicked OK the TOTAL amount for that stock changes in the CASH data register but there is no change in the Market Value of the CASH data register which I assume would show my GBP cash balance.

I have tried all sorts of means to change the values to what I want including using the specify exchange rate to default box when I edit a specific stock in the CASH data register but that doesn't do anything either. When I put in the XChg Rate to give GBP to 1$ it accepts the entry but when I click on OK no changes occur to the sums for that stock.

I have used 1000's of different software's have over 300 on my PC and I have to say I am finding this software quirky to use and counter-intuitive. I am also spending a long time just trying to get it to work for me. It just doesn't work how I would expect. I have used many accounting software like Quicken (Home & Business) version and a many others and they are much more intuitive to use.

Regrettably I can't spend much more time on this and it looks as if I will need to find something else to do the job. A pity because I thought this looked promising but it's so frustrating to use - like I'm pulling my hair out. When that happens I have learned to look elsewhere for another software.

What I am trying to do should not be this hard. I have entered stock transactions in a default currency of $ with a default CASH investment in $. I then wanted to change the CASH from S to GBP and use the exchange rate for each stock transaction to deduct the correct amount from by GBP balance. I admit I am doing this after the transactions have been entered. But it does not seem possible to do this. Perhaps this works if I start from scratch and enter all my stock transactions again, but that's a lot of work and then I may have some other unforseen problem with this software.

[Mark]

Hi TonyWSAE,

Your CASH investment is in GBP, which is not your default currency. It sounds like you have "View / Exchange Rate Adjusted" turned on, so when you are viewing your list of transactions in this CASH investment in the Data Register they are being shown adjusted to your default currency. That is why when you look at the transaction in the Data Register it looks like:

140 shares @ $14.98 fee $15 resulting in a value of $2112.19

but when you edit that transaction, it is showing up as:

with VALUE 2112.19, SHARES 2112.19. PRICE 1

All prices/transactions are entered in the native/assigned currency (GBP in this case). You can then display them in either the native currency (View / Exchange Rate Adjusted = OFF) or adjusted to your default currency, based off your exchange rate settings (View / Exchange Rate Adjusted = ON).

You might want to turn off "View / Exchange Rate Adjusted" temporarily, so you can see everything for this investment in GBP, to eliminate some confusion. Toggling this option doesn't change any of your data, just how it is displayed.

All transactions and prices in your CASH investment should be at a price of 1. Do not edit your price to be the exchange rate. Since your cash is not in the default currency, you can't use transaction specific exchange rates, so leave that option un-checked.

When you edited your transaction to be:

the PRICE multiplier to the exchange rate of 0.59862825 and click on the VALUE field it changes to 1,264.42 which is the correct amount in GBP i.e. £1,264.42

You did not change the SHARES. You just changed the amount per share you paid. You still ended up owning the exact same number of shares. The Market Value is the number of shares you own, times the market price. Changing how much you paid per share leaves you with the same number of shares, and is not updating the market price. (You can see all your market prices under the data type of "Prices"). Instead, if you edited that transaction to be:

PRICE: 1, SHARES: 1,264.42, VALUE 1,264.42

that would change your number of shares due to this transaction from the original 2112.19 down to 1264.42, and would lower your market value by this same difference.

Cash is just like any other investment, in that the number of shares you own is the sum of all transactions. The market value is the share quantity times the market price (not your transaction price). Cash is usually kept at a constant price of 1, so the share balance will equal the market value. All transactions should be recorded at a price of 1 also.

So, try this: Turn off "View / Exchange Rate Adjusted". Make sure all your transactions are recorded with a PRICE of 1, and the shares are equal to the value, and equal to the amount you want in GBP. Also, change the data type to "Prices" in the upper/right corner of the Data Register, and make sure all your closing prices are at 1. Now, your market value is the sum of all shares bought/sold.

I realize the multiple currency feature can be confusing, especially in this case where you have your cash in the non-default currency. If the above doesn't help get you straightened out, please give us a call on Monday at 480-705-0129. (We can also do Skype if you are outside the US, and would prefer not to call). We can do a short web conference with you, and I'm sure we can get it straightened out in a short amount of time.

[TonyWSAE]

Mark,

It sounds like you have "View / Exchange Rate Adjusted" turned on

No I have checked it is OFF.
But putting all that aside I have finally discovered how to make this work by setting up a new portfolio from scratch with the default currency set to GBP and the CASH account set to GBP.
When I enter a dollar investment I do so with the currency set to USD and FM then deducts an amount in GBP from my CASH funds. It's not the correct amount at this stage as it's used a default exchange rate of GBP to USD of 1.6.

I have to go in and edit the investment and change the exchange rate used from 1.6 to the correct one used at the time the investment was purchased. I don't understand why FM does not present the option to specify the investment exchange rate when entering a new investment. The box to specify the X-Chg rate only appears when you go back to edit the investment.

I also now know why when editing an investment for price why the value does not change in the portfolio editor screen even though the values have changed in the data register for that investment. The only way to edit the value is through the Update Price - Single Investment, using the "closing price" field with the same date the stock was purchased. Then the "Value" in the Portfolio editor is correctly adjusted to be what it should be.

The frustration I have had with FM is that it has not behaved as I would have expected when editing fields and then seeing the results are not reflected where I would have expected.

I will now persevere with FM to investigate it further. From a users point of view I have found the manual woefully inadequate. Basic problems like setting up and editing investments could be far better explained than they currently are in the documentation. This would have saved both of us a lot of time and frustration.

[TonyWSAE]

Hi,
Just when I thought I had this cracked something else strange has just happened.
Having entered all my historical data into FM for my own portfolio (which now works as it should) I created another separate portfolio for my wife which uses CHF as the default currency and not GBP as mine is.

After I set up the account (which I know how to do now) I find when I enter stocks bought in USD that FM is deducting the USD amount from the CHF default CASH balance and there is nothing I can do to change it.

Options -Currency Settings is CHF and the Portfolio under Properties - is set to use the Default Cash account for this portfolio.

The one investment I entered that was not in CHF but USD had a exchange rate figure entered in the "Specify exchange rate to default" box for that investment but changing the exchange rate makes no difference to the amount deducted from the Cash CHF balance. FM deducts the USD value not the CHF value when viewed in the data register for the cash account.

Just how is this possible ?

I have deleted everything and started again (twice) and done nothing differently as far as I can see in setting up a new portfolio but can now not replicate the problem described above. There seems to be a gremlin in this software somewhere. I was trying for hours to solve this problem (again) but the only way was to start over again from scratch.

Just what causes FM to cause this problem during setup I don't know.

[Mark]

Hi Tony WSAE,

If you have CHF as your default, and in a USD investment you enter a transaction with a transaction specific exchange rate, that will cause the amount of the cash CHF entry to be adjusted accordingly. If you enter the transaction first, and then set your currency settings later, this will not change your recorded transactions. Maybe that is what happened?

Also, your "Options / Currency Settings..." are global to all sub-portfolios. You cannot have one sub-portfolio with a default currency of GBP and a different sub-portfolio with a default currency of CHF. You can use different portfolio files (*.mm4), to have separate default currencies in each portfolio file. The drawback here is that you don't have both accounts open at the same time. If you want to be able to view your accounts in various default currencies within the same portfolio file, you can use currency templates, as described here:

http://fundmanagersoftware.com/help/dlg_currency.html