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Posted by Oilcan on December 6, 2007, 1:44 am
Please log in for more thread options In my case, I download to five significant digits, web shows three and paper
statements show three. So which is the correct number? Probably five, but
the legal document is (paper statement) three so I choose to round to
three. Yes it does get out of wack overtime. Due to my election for
Vanguard to manage - subtractions of fees, new investments and occasional
rebalancing I have 200 + transactions per month over six funds. Don't get
me started that the management fee is downloaded as a remove shares and not
as a sale and a misc expense. Ugly.
In all - I do not fault Quicken - its Vanguard's problem that they can
correct by modifying the statement issued and the web presentation. Until
they do (not holding my breath...) I just live with this. If they do
modify - what a mess.
Cheers!
Oilcan
> R. C. White wrote:
>
>>> I believe the problem is more likely to occur when you download
>>> transactions to investment accounts; and very likely to occur when
>>> you "reinvest" in stocks.
>>
>> As I said, I don't download transactions. I haven't invested in
>> mutual funds in a decade or so, and I never had one (for myself or a
>> client) that did not round to .001 share - at least, so far as I
>> could see on the documents. I may have been entitled to .3333333333
>> shares, according to the behind-the-scenes calculations, but .333
>> share was what I got. And if I had tried to sell .3333 shares,
>> Quicken would have yelled "Foul" - and so would the fund manager,
>> probably. John, would YOUR mutual fund actually let you sell .33333
>> shares, if that's what their calculations said you have? Or would
>> they limit your sale to .333 shares?
>
> I didn't mean to make it sound like I could sell a more of shares than my
> financial institution said I had. In fact, I think that unless one can
> demonstrate an error on the part of the fi, the fi's record of the number
> of shares owned is the final word.
>
> No, the problem I'm referring to (and as I said, it may be a shrinking
> problem) is when the financial institution reports number of shares to a
> different degree of accuracy than what they have in their system.
>
> One financial institution carried number of shares to six decimal places
> in their computer system, reported transactions to 4 decimal places, and
> reported holdings to 3 decimal places.
>
> One situation where I know this created a problem for me was for
> reinvestments in "stocks" (which do not have any agreed upon 3 decimal
> place limit on the accuracy of your holdings of them). At one time I was
> getting transactions for the reinvestments rounded to 3 decimal places
> while the fi was carrying them in their system at 4 decimal places.
>
> Another situation where this occurs is in 401k accounts where the fi is
> selling mutual funds that are special versions of the funds available for
> non-401k accounts. Those 401k funds are maintained in "units", not
> "shares", and those units are carried by (at least some) 401k admins to an
> accuracy of six decimal places (but only reported to 3 decimal places).
>
>> (John's parenthetical remark that I might be able to demonstrate the
>> effect of timing on rounding apparently refers to the sequence of
>> your arithmetic. For example: 100 * 2/3 = 67, right? Yes, if you
>> multiply 100 times 2 first, you get 200, then divide 200 by 3, you
>> get 66 2/3, which rounds to 67. Or if you divide 100 by 3 you get 33
>> 1/3, then multiply times 2
>> to get 66 2/3 or 67 again. But if you round the 33 1/3 after
>> dividing and before multiplying, you get 33 times 2 equals 66 - not
>> 67. So the sequence of your arithmetic AND your rounding is very
>> important. As a general rule, always multiply first, then divide -
>> and round only the final result. That's grade-school arithmetic, but
>> easy to forget unless we have to work with it on a daily basis - like
>> an accountant does.)
>
> A good point, and you probably can't make it too often.
>
> But actually, I had something slightly different in mind.
>
> If the financial institution is carrying your share balance to a greater
> degree of accuracy than they are reporting (or downloading) to you, as
> time goes along, your Quicken share balances will drift further away from
> your fi holdings.
>
> Suppose you get two reinvestment transactions one year; the first for
> .4002 shares in June, the second, for .4004 shares in December. But
> suppose your fi, while recording the number of shares in their system to 4
> decimal places, is only reporting (and downloading) share values to 3
> decimal places ... so they report that you acquired .400 shares in June
> and .400 more shares in December and you Enter (or download) that into
> Quicken.
>
> Ignoring all other shares of that security for purposes of simplification,
> at the end of the year Quicken would show you holding .800 shares, but
> your financial institution, which is rounding their internal 4 digit
> numbers to 3 decimal places, will have added .4002 and .4004 to arrive at
> .8006 (in their system), which they will report to you as .801 shares.
>
> So Quicken was getting transactions with shares rounded as of the date of
> the transaction; while your fi was accumulating the shares at a higher
> degree of accuracy, then rounding.
>
> You see .4002 rounded = .400
> .4003 rounded = .400
> .400 + .400 = .800
>
> The fi has .4002 + .4004 = .8006 rounded = .801.
>
> If the fi were rounding shares in their internal system to 3 decimal
> places at the time of the transaction, the problem wouldn't occur. If the
> fi didn't print (or download) values rounded to a lower degree of accuracy
> than they maintained in their internal system, the problem wouldn't occur.
>
> What I want is for the fi to present to me the number of shares to the
> same accuracy they maintain them in their own system. If that's six
> decimal places, then print, or download, six decimal places.
>
> As I suggested earlier, I see less and less of this; but it is still true
> of a couple of fi's.
>
> --
> John Pollard
> First initial underscore Last name at mchsi dot com
> Please reply to newsgroup
>
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