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Cost Basis Issue after selling all shares

Paul in Gainesville

The Portfolio Value and Cost Basis report shows two of our former investments with a cost value of $10.38 for one investment and $9.99 for the other. Market value is zero for both as all shares have been sold. I can't figure out how to adjust both Cost Basis to zero.

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Accepted answers

Mark1104

I run into the same problem from time to time

Enter a RTRNCAP (return of capital) transaction for each security you note above. that will zero out the security cost basis.

Then, you'll have to charge off the amounts with a MISCEXP transaction to get the cash column back in synch

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Mark1104

PeteLL

(WIN 10, R34.24 Premier, subscriber) I have the same problem, but am uable to make the ROC prescription work. I tried 2 of the 10 securites for which all shares have been sold--one has a positive cost basis and the other's is negative. In each trial neither the security's cost basis changed nor did the cash in that account change. I tried instead transferring the cash (correction to the cost basis) to a different account and the cash was deposited correctly, but the (incorrect) cost basis remained unchanged. I must be missing something.

DRMick

Rtn of Cap fixed my problem, Thanks

Frankx

Hi @PeteLL,

It's been some time since your last post but I was wondering whether you found another solution to the problem, since the return of capital didn't fix it.

The reason the transfer didn't work was that it only removed the cash from the account, which doesn't fix the basis issue. You might be better served to simply adjust the cost basis through a correction to a prior transaction involving a purchase or reinvestment of dividends, etc. for that security.

Frankx

DRMick

I had a couple securities that were completely sold that had 2 or 3 cents left in the cost basis. I tried to correct the sale transaction and then a previous purchase transaction. I even changed the commissions line. None of it worked to eliminate those pennies. I could not find a way to change the Realized G/L amount so I just used the Ret to capital. But that raises the cash balance to an artificial level as insignificant as it is..