QWin 2016 Premier: AFAXX NAV prices not downloading

Boatnmaniac

About a week ago during OSU the end of day price for American Funds Money Market Fund (AFAXX) started to download a price of $0.00.  At the end of the next day, the correct price for the previous day does download but the current day price again shows $0.00.  Here is what the OSU downloaded pricing history shows for today (10/31).


This results in the end of day value of my investments to be understated since my AFAXX holdings show $0 value. It also messes up Lifetime Planner results.

This is not happening with any other mutual fund (including money market funds) that I have.  For the last 7 yrs the end of day price for AFAXX downloaded properly.  It's only been a problem in the last week.

I've checked to make sure pricing for AFAXX is set up for dowload during OSU.  I also performed a Validate & Repair (no issues found). 

I then set up a new file just for my American Fund holdings and all the mutual funds holdings and prices downloaded properly except for this AFAXX price issue.

Any ideas on what is going on and how to get it fixed?

I'm using QW2016 Premier R14 Build 25.1.14.5 and am running it on Windows 10.

mshiggins

From C. D. Bales:



I have no idea why you are downloading money market fund prices: they are always $1/share. The only thing you can get by downloading prices for mm funds is a problem ... such as the one you are experiencing.



Do yourself a favor: do not select mm funds for price download.



[You can manually correct the wrong mm fund price by going to the Security Detail View, selecting the security, clicking "Update", and selecting "Update Price History".]



[Also be aware: if those mm fund prices are coming from the downloaded holdings from your financial institution; you can not prevent those price downloads. The only fix for that problem is to get your financial institution to fix their downloads.]

Boatnmaniac

I asked for help, not for criticism, especially when you are criticizing something without even trying to understand why the account is set up the way it is.

I have been downloading money market fund prices for more 20+ years without any issue, first when I was using MS Money and then with Quicken starting in 2010.  The reason for doing it is because when I added the FI accounts Quicken automatically sets them up to download prices for each of the securities, including the money market funds.  I was not given an option to not have prices downloaded. It's the same with each FI that I set up.  I just reconfirmed this by setting up a new file and ran through the account set up process for each of my investment FI's...and, once again, the box to download the share price was checked for each security (mutual funds, ETF's, stocks, bonds) and only for AFAXX it shows a share price of $0 for 10/31.

Manually downloading historical prices, like you suggested, does not fix this issue.

Manually entering/correcting the price every day is not a solution, it's a band-aid that is only acceptable until a fix is identified and implemented.

Yes, I agree that downloading prices for money market funds should not be necessary since the price is always $1.  But I have no idea where the downloaded prices are coming from.  How can I find out if they are coming from the FI?

I would be happy to set a standard share price for the money market fund that never needs to be updated and will always shows a price of $1 for every day.  Is that possible and how do I do that?

markus1957

Start by following the advice given and uncheck the box to Download Quotes. That will determine whether Quicken's 3rd party provider or your FI is sending the bad pricing. Nobody suggested manually downloading historical prices. Why would you ever enter $1 every day? Do it once and be happy, that's how.  If the price keeps changing when the download quotes box is unchecked, then it's coming from your FI.

[removed]

Boatnmaniac

[removed - off-topic]

Bales had suggested that I uncheck the box for Download Historical Prices for the specific security via Security Detail and then download historical prices.  I did that and responded that it made no difference.  (I also noticed that Quicken had re-checked the Download Historical Prices afterward.)

He did not suggest that I uncheck the box for Download Quotes from the Securities List or to perform OSU afterward.

After your reply, I deleted a few days of historical prices for this security and then ran Download Historical prices (with the box for this security checked), again.  The deleted historical prices did not re-populate and the missing price for yesterday did not populate. 

I then unchecked the Download Quotes box in Security List (not from Security Details), ran OSU for only the FI in question and the prices for all the dates I'd deleted were re-populated and for the first time the price for 10/31 was populated.  So, it is confirmed that the price downloads are provided by the FI.

If the end of day price for 11/1 does not populate when I run OSU this evening I will contact the FI to get resolution.

Thanks for your help.

mshiggins

From C. D. Bales:


[removed]


Just because you were not asked when you created a new security, does not mean the option does not exist.


" ... the box to download the share price was checked for each security ....".


And what stopped you from unchecking that box at your next opportunity?


Every single security in your Quicken "Security List" should have an option to "Download Quotes" and another option to include the security in your "Watch List": when both those options are unchecked, Quotes will not be downloaded from Quicken quote servers for that security.


And when quotes are not being downloaded from Quicken quote servers, but you get quotes anyway ... every time, and only when, you download from your financial institution; there's a very good chance those quotes are coming from your financial institution. And if that is the case, you will have to take the problem up with your financial institution.


[Other possible sources of quotes:

- any investment transaction (however entered) that includes a "price" will update your price history, if there is not already a price for that date.

- importing a QIF file of investment transactions

- importing a .CSV file of prices

- manually entering a price]


There is no way to automatically have the same price entered for every possible date; but for a mm fund, that is not necessary. A single $1/share price dated on, or before, your earliest transaction for that mm fund would suffice.


And you can simply delete the incorrect mm fund price you now have - a one-time operation. If the incorrect price came from Quicken's quote servers, it won't return if you have told Quicken not to download prices for that mm fund. Your fund will continue to be treated as having a price of $1/share: Quicken uses the most recent previous price when there is no price for a given date. In your case, after you delete the 10/31/17 price, Quicken will use your 10/30/17 price for that mm fund.

[When you have transactions for that mmm fund in the future, Quicken will update your price history (see above) - but if your transactions are correctly entered, that price will be $1/share.]

Boatnmaniac

C. D. Bales - It would have been so nice if you had initially replied
with the information you just provided [removed]

that Quicken does not download prices for any security which has a ticker that
ends in XX (something I found out after additional searching on Quicken Support)
which means that AFAXX downloaded prices are being provided in the FI
transaction downloads.  Therefore price
issues need to be addressed with the FI. 
Until the FI fixes the issue the incorrect price(s) in the price history
for that security can be manually corrected or deleted in the price history (Security
Details-->Price
History-->Edit
Price History).  This will restore the correct
security investment value.  This process
might need to be repeated after each FI transaction download until the FI fixes
the issue on their end.

Simple, to the point, constructive and very helpful.

[removed]

 Have a good day.

EMEL

I have the same problem in Quicken 2016 with the same fund, newly purchased.  However, Quicken help provides an answer - "Quicken does not update prices for money market securities (or any security
whose ticker symbol ends with XX), so don't select
money market securities for updating when setting up your online quotes."  A minor problem with the explanation is that it only applies to AFAXX, not the other double-X MM funds I have owned for years.  Also, it only applies to the AFAXX price for the current day when I download quotes.  If I delete a few days' prices in Price History then download quotes for AFAXX, every day's except today's downloads.  However, if I delete the prices then use "Download Historical Prices", every day's price including today's downloads.  This behavior suggests it is a Quicken problem,  not an American Funds' one.

Jim_Harman

Wow, a lot of passionate discussion here!

I think one part of the issue is that the Help text that EMEL correctly quotes is misleading or out of date.

During a Download Quotes operation, Quicken DOES update prices for securities whose ticker ends in XX, but sometimes the price it puts in the Price history is zero instead of 1.00. This issue has been present for a long time, and I have seen it on and off on more than one money market fund.

The work-around alluded to in the Help, however, does work. As noted above by CD Bales and Markus1957, if you un-check "Download quotes" in the Security list for the affected securities and delete any 0.00 entries in the Price history, thus leaving only 1.00 entries, you should no longer experience this problem. Because (barring a financial meltdown or bad data from your financial institution) money market funds always have a price of $1.00, Quicken's price data will be correct.