Yet Another Incorrect Market Value thread

jamlevi66

I have read several threads, dating back years, matching "Incorrect Market Value" and none of them really says what to do about it. Perhaps, there is no one size fits all remedy, as each account is different. I saw one that mentions a menu item called File Operations>Validate. I wish. Deluxe 2020 Mac version does not have that. Sigh.

Anyway, I download from Fidelity into a Brokerage Account and my Transactions View / register balance exactly matches the balance at Fidelity. It's all cash. No holdings. Great.

But, the Market Value is wrong - it's exactly too much by the Market Value of my last Buy, which was actually a $0 cost RSU transfer in. This buy is visible as a holding, in the Portfolio view, even though it was sold - the Sell transaction is in the register. So, again, the Transactions look perfect, but the Portfolio view is wrong. Does the portfolio view get it's data from the Transactions? One would think it did, yes? Who knows? All I know is the wrong market value is on the Portfolio view. How to fix it?

John_in_NC

Ok-there is a lot to cover here. I am hopeful my comments will help you. My apologies if any of this is stuff you already know, but I want to cover all the bases:

Yes, you could delete the account and download again, but I would hold off on that. And I would only do that if this is a relatively new account in which Fidelity will provide all the historical data. Since your placeholder is from 8/18, then it appears to be relatively new.

If you could restore from a recent backup, that might be easier than deleting the account.

Placeholders serve a legitimate purpose: If I download my 401k account that I have held for 25 years, Fidelity won't provide all 25 years of transactions. I likely will get 90 days worth, and placeholders will be created 1) for each security) to make the final share balance correct, and 2) cash balance. Again, these are acting like opening balance adjustments as that is exactly what they are. They make your shares held/cash balance in Quicken correct and will give you a correct Market Value.

Those placeholders are also "live" in that they will adjust as needed to make the final market balance as needed. For example, if I randomly delete some Buy transactions, upon my next account update, I will see the placeholder update to compensate. 

That Guestimate screen you are looking at isn't dealing with market value but rather cost basis. (How much the securities actually cost you and not what they are worth.) Editing the cost basis won't affect your market value, so I think you might wish to move away from that.

I can't see your data to see if the placeholders are valid or were erroneously being created because Fidelity reported the Sell and delayed updating the Shares held. Usually waiting or two to update will resolve this without user intervention.

Also note: just because it is a placeholder doesn't mean you can't manually recreate the transaction for that date. You can always add an Add Shares transaction or the correct amount (and add Cost basis info if desired) and it will serve the same purpose.

That Live Balance Adjustment is a cash balance adjustment. All I see is it is for $18-I don't know if it is needed or not. 

I hope this doesn't confuse you more, but it should help you figure out what is going on. It appears complicated at first, but will be relatively simple once you see what is going on.

Good Luck, and post back if you have more questions!

John_in_NC

You are correct-there is no single fix-and often the problem is upstream from Quicken in the way the financial institution (FI) is reporting things. That said, it doesn't mean something is broken.

File Operations>Validate is a solution for database corruption of Windows data files. Your Mac version is based around a more modern database that tends to be self healing. Corruption can occur, but it isn't common. And quite honestly, I don't think your issue is database corruption.

Yes, the Portfolio view is based on (or "built from") all the transactions in your register. I suspect that what you are seeing is a timing issue in what Fidelity is reporting: the Sell transaction is pushed out/downloaded, yet Fidelity didn't update the reduced share balance reported. Thus, Quicken auto-generates a Placeholder transaction as an adjustment to make the final share balance correct. You would see this adjusting Placeholder at the very beginning of the register-and still see the holding of this cash in your Portfolio view.

You might not even see this anymore as Fidelity has since updated total holdings in more recent updates. But, again, I suspect this is a timing/reporting issue from Fidelity and Quicken attempting to correctly report the data it is being fed.

I have a monthly purchase of a fund with another FI. That night the Buy comes down I get a placeholder. I could delete the adjustment, but I just wait until the next day when the accurate holding balance gets updated and the adjustment vanishes. 

jamlevi66

Thanks John, you're right, there was a new record at the beginning of the register. When I click on Add Cost, it shows this dialog. And the last sell was 74 shares. I clicked Add Transactions and got the second dialog. I accepted the default values. Still, the Market Value was unchanged. SO, I deleted the record and then the original placeholder came back. Any guidance here?

jamlevi66

I selected Guesstimate and entered the negative value of the amount the market value is off by, thinking it might adjust, but this too had no effect. Then I noticed the Adjustment entry just above the placeholder has a tooltip that states what it says in the 2nd image. After that I deleted the entry and now the register is completely screwed up and I have entries for negative shares in the portfolio view. should i delete the account and start over from scratch?

John_in_NC

Ok-there is a lot to cover here. I am hopeful my comments will help you. My apologies if any of this is stuff you already know, but I want to cover all the bases:

Yes, you could delete the account and download again, but I would hold off on that. And I would only do that if this is a relatively new account in which Fidelity will provide all the historical data. Since your placeholder is from 8/18, then it appears to be relatively new.

If you could restore from a recent backup, that might be easier than deleting the account.

Placeholders serve a legitimate purpose: If I download my 401k account that I have held for 25 years, Fidelity won't provide all 25 years of transactions. I likely will get 90 days worth, and placeholders will be created 1) for each security) to make the final share balance correct, and 2) cash balance. Again, these are acting like opening balance adjustments as that is exactly what they are. They make your shares held/cash balance in Quicken correct and will give you a correct Market Value.

Those placeholders are also "live" in that they will adjust as needed to make the final market balance as needed. For example, if I randomly delete some Buy transactions, upon my next account update, I will see the placeholder update to compensate. 

That Guestimate screen you are looking at isn't dealing with market value but rather cost basis. (How much the securities actually cost you and not what they are worth.) Editing the cost basis won't affect your market value, so I think you might wish to move away from that.

I can't see your data to see if the placeholders are valid or were erroneously being created because Fidelity reported the Sell and delayed updating the Shares held. Usually waiting or two to update will resolve this without user intervention.

Also note: just because it is a placeholder doesn't mean you can't manually recreate the transaction for that date. You can always add an Add Shares transaction or the correct amount (and add Cost basis info if desired) and it will serve the same purpose.

That Live Balance Adjustment is a cash balance adjustment. All I see is it is for $18-I don't know if it is needed or not. 

I hope this doesn't confuse you more, but it should help you figure out what is going on. It appears complicated at first, but will be relatively simple once you see what is going on.

Good Luck, and post back if you have more questions!