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624 lines
22 KiB
624 lines
22 KiB
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
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<chapter id="details.investments">
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<chapterinfo>
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<authorgroup>
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<author>
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<firstname>Ace</firstname>
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<surname>Jones</surname>
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<affiliation>
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<address><email>acejones@users.sourceforge.net</email></address>
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</affiliation>
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</author>
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</authorgroup>
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<date>2009-06-14</date>
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<releaseinfo>1.0</releaseinfo>
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</chapterinfo>
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<title>Investments</title>
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<sect1 id="details.investments.overview">
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<title>Investments in &kappname;</title>
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<sect2>
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<title>Investments</title>
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<para>
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Investments are instruments for investing money that are traded on a market.
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Stocks, bonds, and mutual funds are the most common investments; so they are
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the ones supported most directly. Futures, commodities, options, and more
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complex derivatives are also sometimes used, but &kappname; has no special
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functionality for them. As long as they behave like a stock or a bond, they
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can be tracked easily.
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</para>
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</sect2>
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<sect2>
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<title>Base Currency</title>
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<para>
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Each investment has a Base Currency. This is the currency in which it is
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traded. When a price quote is entered for an investment, the currency of the
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value given is always its base currency. A stock on the NYSE (New York Stock
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Exchange) would be in US dollars, and one on an Australian market would be in
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Australian dollars.
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</para>
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</sect2>
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<sect2>
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<title>Investment Accounts</title>
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<para>
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Investment Accounts hold a collection of investments. An Investment account
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contains transactions, such as buys and sells, of those investments. All
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transactions in an Investment account must relate to a specific investment.
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There is no separate <quote>cash balance</quote> in an investment account. For
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that, you need a Brokerage Account.
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</para>
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</sect2>
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<sect2>
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<title>Brokerage Accounts</title>
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<para>
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An investment account often has an associated Brokerage Account. This is also
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sometimes referred to as a <quote>Cash Account</quote>. Investment accounts
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cannot contain cash transactions, like a transfer from your bank. When a
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stock is sold, the proceeds are typically placed in the Brokerage Account.
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</para>
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<para>
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When you create an Investment Account, you have the option of creating an
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associated Brokerage Account with it.
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</para>
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</sect2>
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</sect1>
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<sect1 id="details.investments.investment">
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<title>Creating an Investment Account</title>
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<para>
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The first step on the path to working with investments is to create an account
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to hold your investments. Choose <menuchoice><guimenu>Account</guimenu>
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<guimenuitem>New account...</guimenuitem></menuchoice> to begin the process of
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adding a new account. Create an account as usual, making sure to choose
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<quote>Investment</quote> as the type of account.
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</para>
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<para>
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To work with the new investment account, navigate to the
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<guibutton>Investments</guibutton> view, and choose the account you have just
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created from the <guilabel>Select Account</guilabel> dropdown box.
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</para>
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</sect1>
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<sect1 id="details.investments.securities">
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<title>Adding Investments to Your Account</title>
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<para>
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To add individual Investments to your Investment Account, navigate to
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the <guibutton>Investments</guibutton> view, and choose the account where the
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investment is held from the <guilabel>Select Account</guilabel> drop-down box.
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</para>
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<para>
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Right-click the mouse in the empty space in the view. This brings up
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the <guimenu>Investment Options</guimenu> context menu. Choose
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<guimenuitem>New...</guimenuitem> from this menu. This launches the
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<guilabel>New Investment Wizard</guilabel> which you use to create your new
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Investment.
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</para>
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<sect2 id="details.investments.newinvestmentwizard">
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<title>New Investment Wizard</title>
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<para>
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The first thing you'll be asked to enter is the type of investment, whether
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it's a stock, bond, etc.
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</para>
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<para>
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Next, the investment details page is presented. The following information is
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entered on this page:
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</para>
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<itemizedlist>
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<listitem><para> Trading Symbol. The ticker symbol used to identify the
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investment on whatever market it trades. &kappname; requires a trading
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symbol for all investments; however some investments do not have symbols.
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In this case, you will need to make up a symbol for it.
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</para></listitem>
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<listitem><para> Full name. The friendly, readable name of the investment
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you're creating, e.g., <quote>Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.</quote> This name is
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also referred to as the security.
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</para></listitem>
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<listitem><para> Fraction. The degree of precision to which your holdings are
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measured. For example, in the US most mutual funds measure holdings to
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three decimal places, so you would enter 1000 in this field. Stocks are
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often measured to only whole units, so you could enter 1 for a stock like
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this.
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</para></listitem>
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<listitem><para> Trading market. Where the stock trades. This is an optional
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field which is provided for your convenience. This information is not used
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anywhere else in &kappname;.
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</para></listitem>
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<listitem><para>Identification. An optional field to enter additional
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identification information you might like to keep track of. Again, this
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information is not used anywhere else.
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</para></listitem>
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<listitem><para>Trading currency. The underlying currency in which this
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investment trades on its market.
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</para></listitem>
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<listitem><para> Price entry. Choose whether the price will be entered as an
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individual price, or as the total for all shares.
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</para></listitem>
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</itemizedlist>
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<para>
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If you are using Online Quotes, ensure that the symbol exactly matches the
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symbol used by your quote source. Yahoo covers most of the world's markets,
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and requires a suffix on the end of symbols outside the US. For example,
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Rubicon Limited on the New Zealand market should be entered as
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<quote>RBC.NZ</quote>.
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</para>
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<para>
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Finally, you're presented with the Online Update screen. This is where you
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tell &kappname; how you would like to update the prices of your investment.
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The following items are set here:
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</para>
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<itemizedlist>
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<listitem>
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<para>
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Use Finance::Quote. This is an option for GnuCash users who are used to
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this style of quotes. Most users can leave this unchecked.
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</para>
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</listitem>
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<listitem>
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<para>
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Online Source. The online source you'd like to use for this particular
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investment. The most common choice is <quote>Yahoo</quote>. Try that
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first, and if the investment cannot be found using this source, then
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experiment with the others.
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</para>
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</listitem>
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<listitem>
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<para>
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Factor. A multiplier that should be applied to quotes retrieved for this
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investment. This is most commonly needed for UK stocks where the price
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quoted is in pence (1/100), and the stock is denominated in pounds. In
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this case, enter 0,01 for the Factor.
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</para>
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</listitem>
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</itemizedlist>
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</sect2>
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</sect1>
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<sect1 id="details.investments.edit">
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<title>Editing an Investment</title>
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<para>
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The Investment view window lists your current holdings in this account, along
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with their symbol, value, and price. Right-click the mouse on any of the
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investments to bring up the <guimenu>Investment Options</guimenu> context
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menu, where you have the option to add, edit, or delete individual investments
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from this account. Also, you can update the price of your investments here
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either manually or via their online source. In addition, it is possible to
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close an empty account, or to reopen a closed account.
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</para>
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</sect1>
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<sect1 id="details.investments.ledger">
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<title>Investment Transactions</title>
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<para>
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<screenshot>
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<screeninfo>Investment Transaction Form</screeninfo>
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<mediaobject>
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<imageobject>
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<imagedata fileref="investment-transactionform.png" format="PNG" />
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</imageobject>
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<textobject>
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<phrase>Investment Transaction Form</phrase>
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</textobject>
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</mediaobject>
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</screenshot>
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</para>
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<para>
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Investment transactions are entered and edited in the
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<link linkend="details.ledgers">ledger</link> view, as with other kinds of
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accounts. However, the fields are different, and vary depending on the
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investment transaction type or activity. Investment transactions have some
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additional elements:
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</para>
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<itemizedlist>
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<listitem><para>Activity</para></listitem>
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<listitem><para>Security</para></listitem>
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<listitem><para>Account</para></listitem>
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<listitem><para>Shares, Price, & Total Amount</para></listitem>
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<listitem><para>Fees</para></listitem>
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<listitem><para>Interest category</para></listitem>
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</itemizedlist>
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<sect2>
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<title>Activity</title>
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<para>
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The Activity for an investment transaction describes what action is happening
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to the stock. The following activities are supported:
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</para>
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<itemizedlist>
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<listitem>
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<para>
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Buy/Sell. Use to record purchases or sales of individual investments.
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This action requires an account to transfer the funds from/to.
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</para>
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</listitem>
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<listitem>
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<para>
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Dividend/Yield. Also known as a <quote>Cash Dividend</quote>, this action
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is used for when you receive an interest or dividend disbursement from
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your investment. This action requires an account to transfer the funds
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from/to.
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</para>
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</listitem>
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<listitem>
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<para>
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Reinvest Dividend. This is a dividend where the proceeds are re-invested
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back into the investment.
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</para>
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</listitem>
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<listitem>
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<para>
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Add/Remove Shares. A simple increase or decrease in your balance. This
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should be used very rarely, because it's uncommon for shares to just show
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up in your account (or disappear) unless it's a purchase or a sale.
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</para>
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</listitem>
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<listitem>
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<para>
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Split Shares. Used when the stock is split. Enter the ratio of the split
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in the <quote>Split Ratio</quote> field. For example, in a 3:2 split,
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enter 1.5
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</para>
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</listitem>
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</itemizedlist>
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</sect2>
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<sect2>
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<title>Security</title>
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<para>
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Each investment transaction must be associated with an individual security,
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which is here just another name for an investment. Choose the investment name
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when adding or editing a transaction. The symbol will be displayed when
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viewing it.
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</para>
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</sect2>
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<sect2>
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<title>Account</title>
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<para>
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For any transactions which generate or require money, you must enter the
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account where the money is transferred to/from. If your investment account
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has an associated brokerage account, it's usually best to transfer the funds
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there. This applies to funds for purchase or sale of the investment, as well
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as for fees paid or interest or dividends earned.
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</para>
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</sect2>
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<sect2>
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<title>Shares, Price & Total Amount</title>
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<para>
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For buy, sell, and cash dividend transactions, the number of shares, the price
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per share, and the total amount of the transaction must be established. You
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can enter any two of these, and &kappname; will calculate the third. It's
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usually best to enter just the total amount and the number of shares, because
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these are the known facts of the transaction. The price per share can be
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calculated from these.
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</para>
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</sect2>
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<sect2>
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<title>Fees</title>
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<para>
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With many investment transactions you can include the fees (or commission) you
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paid the broker. If you enter a category for the fee, then a field will be
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shown to the right where you can enter the amount of the fee. If you need to
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enter more than one fee for the transaction, you can use
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the <link linkend="details.ledgers.split">Split Transactions</link> feature.
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In this case, when you complete entering all the splits, the total amount of
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the fees will be shown to the right.
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</para>
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</sect2>
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<sect2>
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<title>Interest</title>
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<para>
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This is how you enter an interest or dividend payment from an invenstment. As
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with fees, if you enter a category, then a field will be shown to the right
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where you can enter the amount. You can also use the split transaction
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feature, if required.
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</para>
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</sect2>
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</sect1>
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<sect1 id="details.investments.foreign">
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<title>Working With Foreign Investments</title>
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<para>
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&kappname; supports multiple currencies and investments, and you may want to
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combine the two. However, doing so requires extra care. As noted above, when
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you added an investment, you had to specify its trading currency. This might
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not be the same as your base currency, and it also might not be the same as
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the account in which you hold the stock or the account where you transfer your
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funds to/from for buys/sells.
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</para>
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<para>
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Consider a hypothetical case. Your base currency is USD. You have an
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investment account in EUR, and a brokerage account also in EUR. In that
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account, you hold shares of TietoEnator, which is traded in SEK.
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</para>
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<para>
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When you enter a buy transaction on this investment, use SEK as the currency.
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So if you buy 100 shares at a price of SEK 248.00, for a total of SEK
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24,800.00, enter these values in the transaction.
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</para>
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<para>
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<screenshot>
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<screeninfo>Currency Warning</screeninfo>
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<mediaobject>
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<imageobject>
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<imagedata fileref="investment-currencywarning.png" format="PNG" />
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</imageobject>
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<textobject>
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<phrase>Currency Warning</phrase>
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</textobject>
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</mediaobject>
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</screenshot>
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</para>
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<para>
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When you choose the brokerage account to fund the transfer, you'll be warned
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that it's in a different currency.
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</para>
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<para>
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<screenshot>
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<screeninfo>Exchange Rate Editor</screeninfo>
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<mediaobject>
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<imageobject>
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<imagedata fileref="investment-exchangerateeditor.png" format="PNG" />
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</imageobject>
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<textobject>
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<phrase>Exchange Rate Editor</phrase>
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</textobject>
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</mediaobject>
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</screenshot>
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</para>
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<para>
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When you finish the transaction, you will be prompted for a price update to
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the investment account's currency, in this case, SEK -> EUR. Review the
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documentation on <link linkend="details.currencies.prices">Entering Prices
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Manually</link> for more information on the price dialog.
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</para>
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<para>
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If you then switch over to the brokerage account, you will see the transaction
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as EUR 2,254.54, assuming an exchange rate is 11.0000 SEK / EUR.
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</para>
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</sect1>
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<sect1 id="details.investments.prices">
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<title>Updating Prices</title>
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<para>
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There are two ways of updating the prices for your investments. You can
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either enter the new price manually or have &kappname; fetch it from the web.
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</para>
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<sect2>
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<title>Manual Price Updates</title>
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<para>
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You can enter prices for your investments using the same
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<link linkend="details.currencies.prices">Price Editor</link> as used for
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currencies.
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</para>
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</sect2>
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<sect2 id="details.investments.onlinequotes">
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<title>Online Price Quotes</title>
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<para>
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&kappname; has the ability to download the latest prices for your investments
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and currencies via the web.
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</para>
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<sect3>
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<title>How Online Quotes Work</title>
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<para>
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At your request, &kappname; will fetch a page from the web that contains the
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latest price for each item. By default, prices are fetched from
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http://finance.yahoo.com, and are subject to the terms and conditions of that
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site.
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</para>
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<para>
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The online quote lookup uses the investment's trading symbol to find the
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price. Therefore, it's important to set the symbol correctly. Yahoo supports
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stocks from most major world markets, so it's usually just a matter of finding
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the correct symbol. For example, TietoEnator trades on the Stockholm Stock
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Exchange market, and its Yahoo symbol is TIEN.ST.
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</para>
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<para>
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To find the trading symbol for a security supported by Yahoo, use the
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<quote>Symbol Lookup</quote> feature at http://finance.yahoo.com.
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</para>
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</sect3>
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<sect3>
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<title>Assigning a Quote Source</title>
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<para>
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In order to get online price quotes, you first have to enable it for each
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investment or currency you want updated, by setting a <quote>Online Quote
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|
Source</quote>. This is the name of the service from which the quote should
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be fetched. KMyMoney ships with several sources to choose from. Yahoo is the
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recommended default source, and should work for most investments and all
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currencies.
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</para>
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<para>
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To assign a quote source to an investment, navigate to the investment summary
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view for the account in which the security is held. Edit the security by
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right-clicking it and selecting <guimenuitem>Edit Investment
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...</guimenuitem>. In the Investment Detail Wizard,
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click <guibutton>Next</guibutton> twice, for the Online Update section. In
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the Online source dropdown box, select the online source.
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</para>
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<para>
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Versions of &kappname; starting with 0.9 contain support for the
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Finance::Quote package for obtaining online quotes. This is intended primarily
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as a convenience for those users converting from the GnuCash finance package,
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which uses it as its native method. If you do select this option, you should
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see a different list of sources, those supported by Finance::Quote. If the
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list is empty, it suggests that the package is not properly installed. See
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their web site at
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<ulink url="http://finance-quote.sourceforge.net">
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http://finance-quote.sourceforge.net</ulink> for more information.
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</para>
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</sect3>
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<sect3>
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<title>Adjusting a quote</title>
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<para>
|
|
Some online sources do not report the price in a base quantity (e.g., EUR) but
|
|
in a fraction (e.g., Cent). Using this information as price will produce wrong
|
|
values for your investments.
|
|
</para>
|
|
|
|
<para>
|
|
If this is the case for your online source, you can use the
|
|
<guilabel>Factor</guilabel> field to enter an adjusting factor. For the above
|
|
mentioned example the factor would be 0.01.
|
|
</para>
|
|
|
|
<para>
|
|
The <guilabel>Factor</guilabel> field is only available if a
|
|
<guibutton>Quote Source</guibutton> has been selected.
|
|
</para>
|
|
</sect3>
|
|
|
|
<sect3>
|
|
<title>Fetching Quotes</title>
|
|
|
|
<para>
|
|
Typically, you will update the prices for all your investments and currencies
|
|
at once. Choose the <menuchoice><guimenu>Tools</guimenu><guimenuitem>Update
|
|
Stock and Currency Prices...</guimenuitem></menuchoice> menu option to bring
|
|
up the online price quotes dialog. Press <guibutton>Update All</guibutton> to
|
|
fetch quotes for all investments and currencies in your &kappname; file.
|
|
</para>
|
|
|
|
<para>
|
|
<screenshot>
|
|
<screeninfo>Update Stock and Currency Prices</screeninfo>
|
|
<mediaobject>
|
|
<imageobject>
|
|
<imagedata fileref="investment-onlineupdate.png" format="PNG" />
|
|
</imageobject>
|
|
<textobject>
|
|
<phrase>Online Stock and Currency Price Update</phrase>
|
|
</textobject>
|
|
</mediaobject>
|
|
</screenshot>
|
|
</para>
|
|
</sect3>
|
|
|
|
<sect3>
|
|
<title>Adding or Editing Quote Sources</title>
|
|
|
|
<para>
|
|
Adding or editing quote sources is not recommended for anyone but the most
|
|
technical user. You should feel comfortable reading HTML and writing complex
|
|
regular expressions. If this doesn't sound like you, we recommend writing to
|
|
the developer's list if none of the quote sources work for you. Ideally,
|
|
please point us to a web page where these quotes can be obtained.
|
|
</para>
|
|
|
|
<para>
|
|
If you do feel up to the challenge, here's how it works. The quote sources
|
|
are contained in the settings dialog.
|
|
Choose <menuchoice><guimenu>Settings</guimenu><guimenuitem>Configure
|
|
&kappname;</guimenuitem></menuchoice>. From there, choose
|
|
the <guilabel>Online Quotes</guilabel> section. You can choose an existing
|
|
source to edit, or create a new one. When you are done with your changes, be
|
|
sure to press the <guibutton>Update</guibutton> button before exiting the
|
|
dialog. Your changes are not saved by default.
|
|
</para>
|
|
|
|
<para>
|
|
The first thing to worry about in an online quote source is the URL. This is
|
|
the page that is fetched from the web. You will see a %1 in all sources, and
|
|
a %2 in currency sources. For investments, %1 is replaced by the trading
|
|
symbol. For currencies, %1 is replaced by the From currency, and %2 is
|
|
replaced by the To currency. This URL is then fetched, all HTML tags are
|
|
removed, and that stripped file is then sent to the page parser.
|
|
</para>
|
|
|
|
<para>
|
|
Note that the URL can also be a file: URL, which the quote fetcher takes to
|
|
mean an executable script. It will pass any command-line arguments to it that
|
|
you have specified, and feed the stdout to the page parser. For example, you
|
|
might have a script called getquote.sh that contains custom quote logic,
|
|
taking the symbol as a single parameter. Your URL would be
|
|
<quote>file:/path/to/getquote.sh %1</quote>.
|
|
</para>
|
|
|
|
<para>
|
|
The page parser looks for a symbol, a date, and a price. Regular expressions
|
|
tell it how to extract those items from the page. Please review the
|
|
documentation for the <ulink
|
|
url="http://qt.nokia.com/doc/3.3/qregexp.html#1">QRegExp class</ulink> at
|
|
http://qt.nokia.com/doc/3.3/qregexp.html#1 for the exact makeup of the
|
|
regular expressions. There should be exactly one capture expression,
|
|
surrounded by parentheses, in each regexp. The date format further tells the
|
|
date parser the order of year, month, and day. This date format should always
|
|
be in the form "%x %x %x". where x is y, m, or d. The date parser is very
|
|
smart. <quote>%m %d %y</quote> will parse <quote>December 31st, 2005</quote>
|
|
as easily as <quote>12/31/05</quote>. Two digit years are interpreted as
|
|
being in the range of 1950-2049.
|
|
</para>
|
|
</sect3>
|
|
</sect2>
|
|
</sect1>
|
|
|
|
<sect1 id="details.investments.unimplemented">
|
|
<title>Unimplemented Features</title>
|
|
<para>
|
|
Certain common features that are normally found with investments are not yet
|
|
implemented in &kappname;. These include: Derivatives (options, futures,
|
|
etc), capital gains, and tax reporting for investments.
|
|
</para>
|
|
</sect1>
|
|
</chapter>
|