Unable to Close an Investment Account with Stock Options.

[Deleted User]

I am unable to close an investment account with stock options.  I searched this group and found that other people over the years have had the same issue with closing investment accounts with stock options.  Each issue was opened and closed without resolution and left the user frustrated, it seems.  When I try to close the account, it comes back with an error message saying that there are still balances in the account.  The only thing I can think of is that the "Shares Granted" is a number still left in the account after it is zeroed out.  I just thought that I would bring it up again in hopes that this time it would be acknowledged by Quicken.   

[Deleted User]

@Quicken_Tyka, @mshiggins, @markus1957, @Sherlock
ISSUE RESOLVED,  I can now close the Stock Options Account.  After doing some further testing, I found out that if there are any shares that are not exercised, that number of shares needs to be manually entered into the "Expire" transaction.  I think this either needs to be documented as a manual adjustment, or the programming updated to have the unexercised, or "left over" shares automatically entered into the "Expire" transaction.

Quicken_Tyka

Hello @Damian

Thank you for taking the time to visit the Community to report this issue, although is apologize that you have been unable to resolve this issue.

 If this issue is related to fractional shares, the recommended solution is to perform a "Sell" transaction to sell all shares.

You will need the name of the holding to perform this action, are you able to locate the cause of the balance in the account?

-Quicken Tyka

[Deleted User]

There are no shares left in the account.  The trading in this stock was in whole shares only with 5 sets of options transactions, so it is very easy to account for all shares.  I can definitely confirm that all shares were sold.  When I click "Edit" for Grant transaction it shows the number shares granted.  I was wondering if this is was the culprit?

Quicken_Tyka

Hello @Damian

Thank you for the response and the additional details.  

As I do not see that it has been done yet,  I would save a backup and run the Validate & Repair as well as Rebuild Investing Lots from the File menu > File Operations > Validate & Repair option.

In the Validate File window that opens, click the top box to "validate file" and "Rebuild Investing Lots" then click OK.

When the validation completes, a data log will open in Notepad, please let us know if any errors or issues are found/repaired, and when ready close and re-open Quicken.

Please let me know how it goes!

-Quicken Tyka

[Deleted User]

 @Quicken_Tyka, That did not work.  I first copied my file and created a test file and followed your instructions.  Only one message regarding a investment transaction in another open account.  It had nothing to do with the account in question. I tried closing the Options Account again, but it gave me the same error message regarding shares in the account. 

But worse yet, the validate deleted all of my ContribX and WithdrwX amounts from reports (again).  That validate issue that deletes ContribX and WithdrwX amounts from reports is a MAJOR FLAW in Quicken.  I have 29 of those transfer types in my accounts.  UNTIL QUICKEN FIXES THIS ISSUE WITH THE VALIDATE AND CONTRIBX AND WITHDRWX, I CANNOT RUN ANOTHER VALIDATE on my live Quicken Data file..  

[Deleted User]

After doing some testing, I have discovered that in order to close the Options account, I had to delete the Grant transactions.  This also deleted all the rest of the options transactions ( Vest, Exercise, Expire) and leaves only the Earnings, Buys, and Sells.  I mentioned in a previous post that I thought it was the Grant transaction that was not being zeroed out.  After this testing, I am more convinced of this. This was all done in a test file, so my Options account is still not able to be closed.  I will await a response from Quicken before I do anything else. 

mshiggins

Is the grant expired? 

I've never tried to close an account since it is an unreversable action. Could you just hide the account instead of closing it?

Deleting the grant and all its associated transactions seems like a pretty drastic step. 

[Deleted User]

@mshiggins
Yes it is a drastic step, but that is the only way I have found to be able to close the account.  The Grant is expired so the account should be able to be closed.  That is why I will not proceed with anything until I hear back from Quicken.  If you don't close an investment account, there is no way to exclude or hide it from certain reports, and if you just treat it as "Separate", it doesn't show up in historical reports.  The only way for closed account to work properly is to close it.

mshiggins

Maybe this is an issue with newer versions? I'm still running Q2017. Never had any issues with my stock option accounts showing up anywhere I didn't want them to show and never had to close those accounts. 

markus1957

This is a legacy issue that goes back at least 10 years without a resolution.  I first posted about it back in 2011. 

As you have discovered, it is caused by Grants of employee stock options still being considered by Quicken to be active holdings in the account in spite of being fully exercised or expired. Clicking the Holdings button in the register shows lots of options grants with zero shares whereas normally lots of stocks with zero shares are not listed. 

The only way to close it is the path you followed; although doing so will create an inaccurate  record, particularly if portions of the grant were exercised.

The account can be hidden and excluded from reports via customization but it is annoying that the account shows up in the default reports. 

Sherlock

mshiggins said:

Maybe this is an issue with newer versions? I'm still running Q2017. Never had any issues with my stock option accounts showing up anywhere I didn't want them to show and never had to close those accounts. 

I'm using the latest subscription.   I have never had any issues with my stock option accounts showing up anywhere I didn't want them to show and I never had to close any accounts in Quicken.   In my opinion, there is no good reason to close an account in Quicken.  The only real difference in Quicken between an account that has been closed and an account that has not been closed is that the account that is closed may not have Online Services ever set up again. 

If you haven't already, you may want to review: https://help.quicken.com/pages/viewpage.action?pageId=3217264

[Deleted User]

@markus1957
Thank you.  I won't worry myself about it since it looks like an issue that will never be resolved.  I will continue to hide it and exclude it from reports.  It is not a huge issue.
@mshiggins @Sherlock
I have found places in Quicken where closed investment accounts will show up unless you close them.  One is on the Home tab.  If you customize your view to show "Investment and Retirement Accounts", any closed investment account that has not been closed, will show up.  There is no option to exclude accounts.  That is how I discovered the issue with my options account.
As for closing accounts - I think it's up to the user and situation.  I prefer to close accounts on Quicken when they are closed at the Financial Institution.  I have never had an issue.  I have 77 closed accounts, 25 of which are investment accounts.  Currently, I have 31 active accounts, 12 are investment accounts.  Being able to close the old unused accounts seems to make Quicken run better (at least it seems that way to me).  Also, if you still need to add transactions or make adjustments to a closed account, it still can be done, like any other account.  The only thing that's permanent is online services are no longer available.  Also, if you need to "activate" a closed account, there is a way to get it back if you know what you are doing.  The transactional capabilities that Quicken added in recent years has made this possible.  Or, if an account is accidentally closed, one could just restore that latest backup, prior to the closing. 

[Deleted User]

@Quicken_Tyka, @mshiggins, @markus1957, @Sherlock
ISSUE RESOLVED,  I can now close the Stock Options Account.  After doing some further testing, I found out that if there are any shares that are not exercised, that number of shares needs to be manually entered into the "Expire" transaction.  I think this either needs to be documented as a manual adjustment, or the programming updated to have the unexercised, or "left over" shares automatically entered into the "Expire" transaction.

markus1957

How did you do that?  When I try to edit, I get a window indicating an Expire transaction cannot be edited.

[Deleted User]

@markus1957 - Instead of clicking on the Edit Button, just click on "Shares" in the transaction.  It will then allow you to enter the number of shares.

markus1957

@Damian Your sleuthing provides a workaround for a decade old bug.  Nice catch!!!!!!!

adding- I was able to close an account I'd kept open for over 10 years because of this issue.  Thanks again.

Sherlock

Damian said:

@markus1957
Thank you.  I won't worry myself about it since it looks like an issue that will never be resolved.  I will continue to hide it and exclude it from reports.  It is not a huge issue.
@mshiggins @Sherlock
I have found places in Quicken where closed investment accounts will show up unless you close them.  One is on the Home tab.  If you customize your view to show "Investment and Retirement Accounts", any closed investment account that has not been closed, will show up.  There is no option to exclude accounts.  That is how I discovered the issue with my options account.
As for closing accounts - I think it's up to the user and situation.  I prefer to close accounts on Quicken when they are closed at the Financial Institution.  I have never had an issue.  I have 77 closed accounts, 25 of which are investment accounts.  Currently, I have 31 active accounts, 12 are investment accounts.  Being able to close the old unused accounts seems to make Quicken run better (at least it seems that way to me).  Also, if you still need to add transactions or make adjustments to a closed account, it still can be done, like any other account.  The only thing that's permanent is online services are no longer available.  Also, if you need to "activate" a closed account, there is a way to get it back if you know what you are doing.  The transactional capabilities that Quicken added in recent years has made this possible.  Or, if an account is accidentally closed, one could just restore that latest backup, prior to the closing. 

In my experience, checking Keep this account separate does exclude an account from the Investment and Retirement Accounts item on a Home view.  If you're seeing otherwise, you may be able to correct the Home view item by removing the item and then adding it back.

Note: Closing an account should have no impact on performance.

In case you are not aware, Quicken does place a limit on the number of accounts by type we may have in a Quicken file: https://www.quicken.com/support/size-or-capacity-limitations-quicken-data-file

Boatnmaniac

Woohoo!  It worked for me on 2 different employee stock options accounts that I hadn't been able to close in 11 and 6 years respectively!

The newest account was simple to identify and enter the missing expired shares and close the account since it had just 1 grant in it.

The oldest account was a little more difficult to identify where the issue was because it was a single account but with multiple grants in it.  What I observed:

• This account was created with MS Money and later converted to Quicken in 2009.
• There were multiple expired grants (they were under water) in 2008 and 2009 while still in MS Money and they all showed the correct quantities in those expired transactions.  So, MS Money worked correctly.
• There were 9 expired transactions entered on 4/26/2010 after I'd already converted the file to Quicken (Quicken 2009).  6 of these transactions had the correct expired quantities entered, 1 had an incorrect quantity entered and 2 had no quantity entered.  Correcting the quantity for the 1 transaction with the incorrect quantity and entering the quantities for the 2 transactions with no quantities allowed me to close the account.
• If the Great Recession hadn't happened all those options wouldn't have expired and I would have been able to retire 5 years earlier than I did! 
  

So it appears that this is perhaps an intermittent issue in Quicken which is why some people have had issues closing out their employee stock options accounts and others haven't.

A big "Thank you!" to @Damian !

[Deleted User]

@markus1957, @Boatnmaniac
You are very welcome.  It was part of my former job so it's second nature for me to investigate things and to want to know the "why" and "how".  I did a lot of systems conversions, testing and troubleshooting and I loved it so it is kind of fun for me.  I guess I am a little crazy that way.

@Sherlock
I have found benefits to closing an account rather than just hiding it or keeping it separate.  But I think it is up to each user to decide what they are comfortable with. I myself have found no issues with closing an account. 
  

Sherlock

Damian said:

@Sherlock
I have found benefits to closing an account rather than just hiding it or keeping it separate.  But I think it is up to each user to decide what they are comfortable with. I myself have found no issues with closing an account. 
  

I'm fine with that too.   Just try not to make up benefits that don't exist.

[Deleted User]

@Sherlock
They exist.  I originally found one when I did some testing on closed accounts.  It involved ContribX and WithdrwX transactions and how they are being deleted when a Validate is done, but doesn't happen in closed accounts.  Also closed accounts are easier to work with in reporting and for me make working with, and maintaining accounts easier.  I have a lot of accounts over 30 years and for me, closing accounts is a benefit.

Sherlock

Damian said:

@Sherlock
They exist.  I originally found one when I did some testing on closed accounts.  It involved ContribX and WithdrwX transactions and how they are being deleted when a Validate is done, but doesn't happen in closed accounts.  Also closed accounts are easier to work with in reporting and for me make working with, and maintaining accounts easier.  I have a lot of accounts over 30 years and for me, closing accounts make a difference.   

Again, please do not make up benefits that do not exist.

I doubt ContribX and WithdrwX transactions are being deleted when a Validate is done.  I don't Validate our Quicken file frequently but we have validated the file and we still have all our ContribX and WithdrwX transactions intact. The ContribX and WithdrwX issue with Validate that I'm aware of is the missing cash amount on the Investment Transactions report.  Perhaps you're confusing the issue.

If you find working with with closed accounts easier, that's fine.  Work with closed accounts.  We have lots accounts too and find it easier work without closed accounts.  

[Deleted User]

Please see the post "ContribX in Investment Transaction report" my post was merged into that one (scroll to the end of the thread).  @Quicken_Tyka submitted an official ticket based on my findings which she easily duplicated.  It is the reporting I am referring to.  I failed to mention that and sorry for the confusion.  The Validate is indeed deleting ContribX and WithdrwlX transaction amounts on all reports.  And, the only way to fix it is to delete and re-enter all the transactions again.  I have done this several times now and with 29 transactions it's pretty tiresome.  If you search, you will find that over the years, several people have had this issue, and only now it is being addressed.

This same behavior does not happen in closed accounts.  The cash transfers in closed IRAs and 401(k)s revert back to Xin and Xout and are not deleted from reports.  The whole idea of forcing the Xin and Xout in IRA/401(k) accounts to ContribX and WithdrwX in the first place is incorrect.  I have several transfers between retirement accounts that are not contributions or rollovers but simply trust to trust transfers, or transfers between brokerage accounts for my IRAs, which Quicken is unable to handle.

Sherlock

Damian said:

Please see the post "ContribX in Investment Transaction report" my post was merged into that one (scroll to the end of the thread).  @Quicken_Tyka submitted an official ticket based on my findings which she easily duplicated.  It is the reporting I am referring to.  I failed to mention that and sorry for the confusion.  The Validate is indeed deleting ContribX and WithdrwlX transactions on all reports.  And, the only way to fix it is to delete and re-enter all the transactions again.  I have done this several times now and with 29 transactions it's pretty tiresome.  If you search, you will find that over the years, several people have had this issue, and only now it is being addressed.

This same behavior does not happen in closed accounts.  The cash transfers in closed IRAs and 401(k)s revert back to Xin and Xout and are not deleted from reports.  The whole idea of forcing the Xin and Xout in IRA/401(k) accounts to ContribX and WithdrwX in the first place is incorrect.  I have several transfers between retirement accounts that are not contributions or rollovers but simply trust to trust transfers, or transfers between brokerage accounts for my IRAs, which Quicken is unable to handle.

So... ContribX and WithdrwX transactions are not being deleted when a Validate is done and this issue has nothing to do with closed accounts.

If closing the accounts does convert ContribX and WithdrwX transactions into XIn and XOut transactions, I would say it is a bug and you should report it to Quicken.  Closing an account should not change the transaction's action.

Note:  We do have ways to enter transfer transactions in IRA accounts so they are not recorded as ContribX or WithdrwX.  For example, using a Deposit or a Withdraw.

[Deleted User]

Word.  I don't want this to be a battle of nick picking words.  Not everything is a battle.  Sorry for getting to caught up in this, and getting off topic.  Have a good evening.