Account balances report is showing unrealized gains for date before the account existed.

Snowman

II have an Account Balances report that shows annually the account balances from 12/31/2013 to 12/31/2021. There is an account listed under Investment Accounts that was not created until 2019 yet it shows a balance for 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018. If if deselect Include unrealized gains it properly shows figures for 2019 on and not prior. So where is Quicken getting the numbers for 2014-2018 before the account was created?

Jim_Harman

@Snowman,

Is the transaction you have identified for the same account and security that show the problem in the Account Balances report?

If deleting and re-entering the transaction does not fix the problem, are you sure there are no other transactions in your file for that date?

If that is the only transaction for that date and re-entering it does not fix the problem, you might try entering separate CGLong and Bought transactions for the same date instead of the ReinvLg.

[Deleted User]

@Snowman - have you tried doing a "Ctrl+Shift+Z"?  It is supposed to recalculate all your investment transactions in the investment register.  I am not sure it will work, but it's worth a try.

The other thing to look for is hidden placeholder transactions.  Check your placeholder settings by going to Edit->Preferences->Investments and verify that "Show hidden transactions" is checkmarked.  

Another thing to try is a validate or super validate, with the recalc lots and/or fix price options checked. Please backup your data file first before you do the validate.

If all else fails, you can try a "Copy File".  File->Copy or Backup File->Create a Copy or Template.  This process copy process usually removes file corruption.  The caveat is that online services for all accounts will be disconnected and will need to be reconnected in the copied (clean) file

Frankx

Hi @Snowman,

Is there any chance that you transferred a security, or securities, into that investment account (created in 2019) from another investment-type account (brokerage, mutual fund. retirement plan, etc.)?  If so that could be the cause of the presentation of unrealized gains in the account.  Another thing to check is the date(s) of the transactions in the account register.  Just because you created the account in 2019, doesn't mean that there can't be one or more transactions in the account register that predates the account start date.

Let me know how things go.

Frankx

Snowman

I did Ctrl-Shift-Z and that did not fix the problem. I have supervalidated the file and all is well. There are no transactions dated earlier than 1/31/2019 in either the cash account or the investment account. Is that any report that I could print to try and track where Quicken is coming up with this information.

Jim_Harman

In the Account Balances report, one thing you can do is to click on the gear to customize it and select Account detail. Set the ending date prior to 1/31/2019 and the report should show which securities are contributing to the balance.

By setting the date earlier, you can see when the incorrect balance first appears. Then go to the Security Detail view for the problem securities and see if there is a transaction on that date. There may be something wrong with the transaction that needs to be fixed, or perhaps deleting and re-entering the transaction will fix things.

Always back up your data file before changing historical data, in case something goes wrong.

Please let us know what you find!

Snowman

Very interesting. I set the ending date to 12/31/2018 and the account is question displays the proper amount $0.00. I then started incrementally setting the ending date by two months and when the ending date was 11/30/2021 the report was correct. When I set the ending date to 12/31/2019 the bad data returned. I then discovered the ending date with correct information was 12/21/2021. When I changed the ending date to 12/22/2021 the erroneous data returned. I found the transaction that seems to be the culprit. I have attached the transaction. When I deleted it the information corrected itself. When I reenter the transaction the bad data is back.

[Deleted User]

You might have a variation of the "Quadrillion" issue.  The fix for that may work for your issue. 

    1.  Print a report of all the transactions for the affected security in the account displaying the invalid amounts.  (Reports > Investing > Investment Transactions)
    2.  Create a backup of the Quicken Data File through the File menu > Backup & Restore.
    3.  Next, create a empty, manual investment account called "temp", deleting the opening balance transaction once created. (Tools > Add Account > Brokerage > Advanced Setup > I want to enter my transactions manually)
    4.  Use the "Move investment transactions" feature (investment register gear wheel icon menu) to move the affected security transactions to the empty "temp" account we created.
    5.  Use "Export to QIF" to export the same transactions in the "temp" account to a text file. (File > Export File > QIF File)
    6.  Use "Import from QIF" to import the transactions back into the original account. (File > Import File > QIF File)
    7.  Delete the "temp" account.
    8.  Compare the imported transactions against the printed report to check for errors, correcting any issues found.

It may be worth a try if nothing else will fix your issue.

Frankx

Hi again @Snowman,

Based on what you've found (based on you post of 1:32pm today) it is obvious that that transaction dated 12/22/21 is the problem.  It is hard to say exactly what is wrong with that entry, but it almost doesn't matter. So first make a backup of your datafile.

Next, you need to, make sure you have all the details of that one transaction copied down correctly (you can use the data from the entry in Q, or from the broker's website), just make sure that you have all the details so you can replicate it.  After you have done that - delete the entry.

Next - re-enter that one entry manually, completing all the required fields that you've copied down.  Then rerun the report using the current date.

Let me know how that goes.

Frankx

Jim_Harman

@Snowman,

Is the transaction you have identified for the same account and security that show the problem in the Account Balances report?

If deleting and re-entering the transaction does not fix the problem, are you sure there are no other transactions in your file for that date?

If that is the only transaction for that date and re-entering it does not fix the problem, you might try entering separate CGLong and Bought transactions for the same date instead of the ReinvLg.

Boatnmaniac

@Snowman - Are you running R42.21?  If so, I'm wondering if this issue might be a problem with the report and not with the transaction.  I and at least a couple of others have observed some odd results in saved customized reports.  Making changes to the customizations still returned odd and inconsistent results and the new customizations would not save.  For me it affected every one of my saved customized reports.  I had to open new default reports, customize them and save them to resolve the issue and get consistent results, again.  This might not be the issue you are experiencing but I thought you might want to see if opening and customizing a new default report fixes the issue for you.

Snowman

Jim, Thanks  This solved the problem.  "If that is the only transaction for that date and re-entering it does not fix the problem, you might try entering separate CGLong and Bought transactions for the same date instead of the ReinvLg.