Vanguard Dividends

[divinest]

Hi Mark, When dividends are getting paid out for Stock holdings with Vanguard, the dividends are getting invested to the money market (default core) account, however when downloading the transactions there are duplicate entries being created
1. When the dividends paid out
2. Money market showing as purchase of dividends
What is the recommended way to handle this scenario here is an example

[Mark]

Hi divinest,

In Vanguard brokerage accounts I believe they explicitly report money market transactions. For example, if you have a dividend, you'll get 2 transactions showing up in the Preview Importing Transactions:

Dividend in stock for $X
Buy of Money Market for $X

Therefore, for these accounts you may prefer to simply set the default cash account to "<none>", so FM doesn't record a default cash account entry.

The other option would be to create a "sweep" cash investment, and designate that as your default cash account, instead of the money market.

[divinest]

Thanks Mark for your suggestion, i did review some older posts as well where other clients had the same issue with switching to vanguard brokerage service from mutual fund accounts.
So with option 1. If i choose to turn off the default cash account, how are other distribution or purchases going to be handled? (for example, if i transfer funds from my bank to purchase new funds or take the distribution from funds payouts to send it to my bank
with option 2. creating the sweep account, since that is at portfolio level, both dividends from stocks and mutual funds go in there right, what happens to the settlement account that vanguard uses?

Would the other option of just ignoring the import for duplicate entry solve the issue? Little bit more work during import, but would that have any other incorrect reports with performances etc.

[Mark]

Hi divinest,

Option 1) If you transfer funds, Vanguard will likely just show a buy in your money market, which is correct. If you withdraw funds, they will show a sell of your money market. You can experiment, and turn this off for a while, and see how your transactions come in. When you're looking at the "Preview Importing Transactions" screen those are all explicitly listed transactions reported by the broker. You can determine what FM will do for your default cash account entries, based on know what your default cash account setting is. Any transactions not in your default cash account investment will have a corresponding entry automatically created.

Option 2) This would just be a temporary place for money to go. If you get a dividend, it will be deposited here. When Vanguard buys some money market, it will be taken out of here.

I would suggest trying option 1, it is probably the easiest/cleanest.

[divinest]

thanks Mark, will try with option #1 - turn off the default cash account for Vanguard portfolio only and see how it goes and if that works with tracking the information, should be good to go.
Do you see any issues with not having a default cash account assigned for Vanguard?

[Mark]

Hi divinest,

I don't know of any issues. I would just watch your importing transactions, and realize you won't be getting default cash account entries for this sub-portfolio.

[divinest]

Sure, but those transactions should be coming from vanguard on the settlement account as buy/sells i assume.

[Mark]

Yes, that is correct