Unexpected Historical Return Number

[ballardian]

Ok some more digging and I discored where things go really wonky is January of this year when I redeemed most of the MM cash to buy a new position. Prior to that the OOP Historical %Gain was in the 5% range which seems a bit high but entirely within reason.

I bought a new position for almost all the money leaving only about 100 dollars in the MM fund. The cost basis at the point was lower than the amount of money I withdrew so the cost basis went negaive and making the OOP Historical %Gain N/A at that point. As I recorded new dividents the oop cost basis increases and finally passed zero moving from N/A to large %. Couple that with the fact the MM basically pays 0 interest right now.

With each subsequent divident recorded the cost basis increases and in theory the % will get smaller.

The only other thing I have been doing that I don't believe would impact this is I am buying positions monthly skipping the money market account. So I add the buy in and then go into the MM and delete the coresponding transaction. All numbers have lined up and started a bit after that first big purchase this year.

[Mark]

The "Out of pocket basis with AI (between)" is your out of pocket cost basis for the report date range including accrued interest: out of pocket contributions plus the beginning value plus beginning accrued interest (OOP invested (btw) + Beg value + Beg accrued interest). This figure is your break-even value over the report date range when factoring in accrued interest.

So, if you have a basis of X and then you record a positive distributed dividend for Y, your cost basis should decrease by Y, to a new OOP basis of X - Y. You received money, lowering your cost basis. It sounds like your basis is increasing. Are you maybe recording a negative valued dividend?

It sounds like the issue is your cost basis being very near 0, so when you divide it into the Gain, you're getting a very large number. Your OOP cost basis is what you put into the investment. If you've somehow taken out more than you put in, the basis can go negative. When this happens, the %Gain will be N/A.

If your goal is to measure performance, you might try using an ROI field instead of this %Gain.

[ballardian]

Hi Mark -- I think you are correct that is what is happening. Thank you for a better summary than I had typed out. I can't find any negative dividends.

I checked and that is exactly what happened on 5/5 I removed a few dollars more than I had contributed. (basis + interest - withdrawl = 1/2 of interest left in the account) making the basis negative and OOP HIstorical %Gain N/A. With each new dividend from ETF1 the basis rises and finally this month went + but close to zero as you pointed out.

I''ll see if ROI works better for me. I use that is most of my actual tracking the OOP Historical %Gain I've just use for a quick view into what has done best in Portfolio Editor. And more than anything in this case I wanted to make sure something wasn't wrong with my data input,etc. But thanks to you I finally can see and understand how this happened in this particular situation - I don't think I would have figured this one out so easily without your help.

As always thanks for the amazing support to your product.