How do I resolve placeholders using combination of initial shares purchased and the average of div.?

Question

I've just set up Quicken and am now resolving placeholders.  I want to be able to enter two transactions:  the first is to enter the initial investment by "purchasing shares" and then I want to enter the average of the dividends.  The dividends have no cost basis, so I am not sure how to enter the "average" cost basis.  I have approximately 30 dividends over the course of many years so I don't want to enter them individually.  How do I go about this?  I know I can just do one average transaction for all instead of two, but I want to be able to separate into two so that I can enter the initial investment/purchase.

Any help would be much appreciated!  (I wish Quicken would provide examples.)

Jim_Harman · Accepted Answer

If you have the total amount of dividends that were reinvested and the total number of shares these were purchased through reinvestment, you could use that info to resolve the portion of the placeholder caused by the reinvested dividends,  recognizing that Quicken's tax lot info will be incorrect.

You would enter one big Reinvest transaction with the total amount of the dividends and the total number of shares

q_lurker · Accepted Answer

That is just a bit different than 30.  

Meaning you do not know the price paid?  The price that was paid was the amount of the dividend for that security for that period (quarter) for the number of share you had at that time.

Now if you don't have or can't gather that type of information, about all you can do in Quicken is enter an Add Shares transaction for each security, specify the number of shares you are adding, identify an appropriate acquisition date (most recent quarter?), and go with a $0 basis or some wild best guess.  The acquisition date is mostly relevant to Quicken telling you about LT or ST cap gains.  The $ basis also for cap gains evaluation.

In both those regards, the old computer adage of GIGO applies.  With manufactured data, Quicken's evaluation will be suspect.  All a question of what you need and expect. from the program