Miscellaneous Quicken Questions

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AltaRed
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Re: Miscellaneous Quicken Questions

Post by AltaRed »

That is fine as long as you do not change your mind several years down the road. I am not certain the specific years but I recall having not upgraded for many years, and when I did do so, I had to find an intermediate conversion in order to get up to date. I recall it was not overly difficult but it told me not to get too far behind.

For example purposes only, say you were using Quicken 99 and your new OS on your new PC in 2013 was not compatible with Quicken 99. You could not necessarily upgrade to Quicken 2013 and have it convert your Quicken 99 files. You might have to convert the Quicken 99 files to Quicken 2005 files first, and then to Quicken 2013.
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Re: Miscellaneous Quicken Questions

Post by Wallace »

I recently started buying US equities in my TD Canadian SD RRSP and it doesn't look as if US stocks appear in Quicken on the dropdown box of a $CAN RRSP account.

Do I have to open a separate investment account (rather than a retirement account) to track dividends, etc in US stocks? I've been doing that anyway in my RBC accounts, because RBC separates CAN and US investments, but TD doesn't. It exchanges all $US dividends in my (self-directed) RRSP to $CAN automatically and records the total in $CAN. How can I best record this in Quicken?
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Re: Miscellaneous Quicken Questions

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All my securities in Quicken are set up manually.
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Re: Miscellaneous Quicken Questions

Post by ig17 »

I use two separate Quicken accounts to track one TDW RRSP account.

Account #1: CAD$ holdings
Account #2: US$ holdings

I record US$ dividends in US account, then do XOut to Canadian account. Quicken prompts for exchange rate when you save the XOut transaction. You have to enter the correct rate so the number on the Canadian side matches TDW records.
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Re: Miscellaneous Quicken Questions

Post by pmj »

ig17 wrote:I use two separate Quicken accounts to track one TDW RRSP account.
This is also exactly how I do it. The US$ account will then offer-up the US-listed securities.
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Re: Miscellaneous Quicken Questions

Post by ig17 »

Another tip about this setup. I use a pair of Bought/SoldX transactions to record Norbert's Gambit.

Going from CAD to USD, I enter this in the CAD$ account:

Bought 100 shares @ price X
SoldX 100 shares @ the same price X. Proceeds go to the US$ account.

Quicken prompts for the exchange rate when you save SoldX. I enter my effective gambitted rate.
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Re: Miscellaneous Quicken Questions

Post by Wallace »

Thanks all. That was the setup I ended up with. Glad I'm not missing anything.

Ig17, thanks for the tip. what company do you use for Norbert's gambit? I'll be doing it for the first time in the next week or so. (Thanks Norbert)

I haven't owned US shares for many years while the $US was falling against $CAN. Now that the US is recovering and the $CAN is likely to fall, it seems a better time to do it.
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Re: Miscellaneous Quicken Questions

Post by ig17 »

Wallace wrote:what company do you use for Norbert's gambit?
I use resource stocks that trade millions of shares a day on both exchanges. Potash, Encana, Suncor, Canadian Natural Resources. These can be quite volatile so you have to be careful. I watch the trend before I pull the trigger. I try to catch a stock in an uptrend.

Many posters seem to prefer less volatile stocks such as banks and railroads.
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Re: Miscellaneous Quicken Questions

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Using Quicken 2013 Home and Business and doing some tax planning. So I ran the Schedule 3 - Capital Gains report.

I'm not sure if surprised is the right word, maybe disappointed is better. WTF is the Canadian version of Quicken showing Short Term and Long Term sections :shock: of the report, with no option to Customize and get rid of this American behaviour :evil: .
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Re: Miscellaneous Quicken Questions

Post by AltaRed »

To my knowledge, it has always been this way. IOW, I think they only change (from USian version) the things people are likely to use/notice most.
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Re: Miscellaneous Quicken Questions

Post by queerasmoi »

Peculiar_Investor wrote:Using Quicken 2013 Home and Business and doing some tax planning. So I ran the Schedule 3 - Capital Gains report.

I'm not sure if surprised is the right word, maybe disappointed is better. WTF is the Canadian version of Quicken showing Short Term and Long Term sections :shock: of the report, with no option to Customize and get rid of this American behaviour :evil: .
Don't forget that in the CG report, for US securities you need to check the "use transaction currency" option for proper calculations.
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Re: Miscellaneous Quicken Questions

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queerasmoi wrote:Don't forget that in the CG report, for US securities you need to check the "use transaction currency" option for proper calculations.
It depends on how you enter the transactions and which forex rate you use in reporting.

Different strokes for different folks.
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Re: Miscellaneous Quicken Questions

Post by queerasmoi »

adrian2 wrote:
queerasmoi wrote:Don't forget that in the CG report, for US securities you need to check the "use transaction currency" option for proper calculations.
It depends on how you enter the transactions and which forex rate you use in reporting.

Different strokes for different folks.
I know the two typical ways to track ACB with forex is either a per-transaction rate, or an average annual exchange rate. My understanding is, if you don't check "use transaction currency", it uses the US$ value to calculate ACB throughout the period of holding the securities. I believe that would produce incorrect results no matter which approach you use.
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Re: Miscellaneous Quicken Questions

Post by adrian2 »

queerasmoi wrote:
adrian2 wrote:
queerasmoi wrote:Don't forget that in the CG report, for US securities you need to check the "use transaction currency" option for proper calculations.
It depends on how you enter the transactions and which forex rate you use in reporting.

Different strokes for different folks.
I know the two typical ways to track ACB with forex is either a per-transaction rate, or an average annual exchange rate. My understanding is, if you don't check "use transaction currency", it uses the US$ value to calculate ACB throughout the period of holding the securities. I believe that would produce incorrect results no matter which approach you use.
I use the average annual forex and I convert the values from USD to CAD myself, for each transaction.
I do not use automatic updates of security prices, as I don't want "junk" accumulating in my file; if I need prices, I update them myself.
Therefore, I don't need to check "use transaction currency".
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Re: Miscellaneous Quicken Questions

Post by queerasmoi »

adrian2 wrote:
I use the average annual forex and I convert the values from USD to CAD myself, for each transaction.
I do not use automatic updates of security prices, as I don't want "junk" accumulating in my file; if I need prices, I update them myself.
Therefore, I don't need to check "use transaction currency".
So what you're saying is, you convert the values from USD to CAD yourself for each transaction, and record 100% of your transactions in Quicken in CAD?

Otherwise I am not sure I understand how you record your USD transactions in such a way that Quicken would give a correct CG report without "use transaction currency".

The minimal case I'm imagining here is, suppose you buy 100 shares of security A in year X for US$20, and sell it in year Y also for US$20. However in year X, US$1=CAD$0.95, and in year Y, US$1=CAD$1.05. So a correct accounting for this would see a capital gain of CAD$200. If "use transaction currency" is disabled, Quicken's CG report will give a $0 CG.
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Re: Miscellaneous Quicken Questions

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queerasmoi wrote:So what you're saying is, you convert the values from USD to CAD yourself for each transaction, and record 100% of your transactions in Quicken in CAD?
Exactly.
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Re: Miscellaneous Quicken Questions

Post by queerasmoi »

adrian2 wrote:
queerasmoi wrote:So what you're saying is, you convert the values from USD to CAD yourself for each transaction, and record 100% of your transactions in Quicken in CAD?
Exactly.
Okay, so let me revise my previous statement, since your method of record-keeping does not record your US$ securities in US$.

Don't forget that in the CG report, for securities you record in US$ you need to check the "use transaction currency" option for proper calculations.
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Re: Miscellaneous Quicken Questions

Post by ig17 »

queerasmoi wrote:Don't forget that in the CG report, for securities you record in US$ you need to check the "use transaction currency" option for proper calculations.
A similar statement applies to Investment Performance report.

If you want to calculate an accurate IRR number (why wouldn't you? :wink:), check "Transaction Exchange Rate" option in the Customize dialog.
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Re: Miscellaneous Quicken Questions

Post by tedster »

I have an RRSP account which I track in Quicken. A while ago I made several purchases of US stocks in this account. I realize that my amounts are not being accurately tracked. So I have set up a RRSP US$ account. How do I transfer the pertinent transactions? Do I have to re-enter them all and delete from the Cdn $ account?
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Re: Miscellaneous Quicken Questions

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tedster wrote:I have an RRSP account which I track in Quicken. A while ago I made several purchases of US stocks in this account. I realize that my amounts are not being accurately tracked. So I have set up a RRSP US$ account. How do I transfer the pertinent transactions? Do I have to re-enter them all and delete from the Cdn $ account?
This is how I split my accounts as I have not found any other way to manage dual currencies. You will have to re-enter your initial transactions because the ones in your CDN dollar account cannot be switched to a USD account. You will notice stocks will not even show up in the drop down if the currency does not match the account currency.
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Re: Miscellaneous Quicken Questions

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Re: Miscellaneous Quicken Questions

Post by CROCKD »

This pertains to how to make a particular entry in Quicken. I have Quicken 2011 and enter all my data manually.
Some iShares for some years issue reinvested distributions. These are not cash payments nor do they result in the issue of more shares. For tax purposes they result in an increase in the ACB.
In the past I recorded this in Quicken as a -ve ROC. But for the last two tax years Quicken will not accept a -ve amount as a ROC.
My question is how do others account for these reinvested distributions in Quicken?

I also keep an Excel file for ACB and have correctly allowed for it there but would like to get my Quicken file correctly identifying this item.
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Re: Miscellaneous Quicken Questions

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CROCKD wrote:This pertains to how to make a particular entry in Quicken. I have Quicken 2011 and enter all my data manually.
Some iShares for some years issue reinvested distributions. These are not cash payments nor do they result in the issue of more shares. For tax purposes they result in an increase in the ACB.
In the past I recorded this in Quicken as a -ve ROC. But for the last two tax years Quicken will not accept a -ve amount as a ROC.
My question is how do others account for these reinvested distributions in Quicken?
Enter the ROC as positive $1.
Save the entry, then go back and edit it: you'll now be able to save it as a negative amount.
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Re: Miscellaneous Quicken Questions

Post by CROCKD »

Thank you Adrian.
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Re: Miscellaneous Quicken Questions

Post by larry81 »

hi folks,

Quicken user here, investing in taxable account (canadian corporation). Like many others, my accountant is currently handling all tax issues. In the next few months i want to get a better hold of this part and deliver him a 'fully prepared package' that he could simply verify at year end instead of compiling the data himself. I would like to make sure that i understand how to handle things in Quicken.

I already enter all buy/sell operation and dividends distributions, its the ROC part that i am not sure. For the record, i dont DRIP in my taxable account.

I know that the tax breakdown of each distribution are disclosed at year end on the CDS Innovation website.I also see that tax breakdown is published for the whole year on various ETF provider website (ex: ROC of 0.00162 for the YEAR)

Does each distribution need to be adjusted at year end or can i simply perform one operation with the 'annual' value found on the ETF provider website ? Is there any walkthrough on how to enter this data in quicken

Best regards !
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