Investment account market values disagree with FIs

Rocket J Squirrel · January 31

I have investment accounts at Morgan Stanley Wealth Management and Fidelity Investments. Both download just fine for me every day.

I just noticed that QWin R60.20 is reporting different total market values from what the Financial Institutions' web sites report, even immediately after downloading from the FIs. In some cases, the differences are several thousand dollars. This is true for all 6 of my investment accounts.

I have not yet drilled down to look at things like share price discrepancies. Right now, I'm just wondering whether other QWin users are seeing this. I.e., is this considered "normal"? Anyone?

bmciance · January 31

I have 4 accounts at Fidelity and every day I check them to the web site. I am only off pennies due to rounding. Of course, it depends on when I check. Sometimes they agree around 30 minutes after market close. Other times it takes an hour or two before the prices are in sync.

I also have 3 accounts at Schwab and they usually agree to the penny within maybe 30 minutes of market close.

I am currently using QWin R60.20.

Edit: I'm not sure about Morgan Stanley but since Fidelity doesn't download transactions same day (you only get up to the previous day) that can cause differences in the market values in Quicken vs the web site.

Rocket J Squirrel · February 1

@bmciance

I'm not sure about Morgan Stanley but since Fidelity doesn't download transactions same day (you only get up to the previous day) that can cause differences in the market values in Quicken vs the web site.

That's good info, but these accounts are largely inactive. I'm not an active trader. I just sit back and rub my hands like Scrooge McDuck while my pile of gold coin grows via auto-downloaded divs & gains. So transactions like Buy/Sell/etc. are absent. I will go over the accounts this weekend while there's no activity and see what I can see. (Beats doing my actual chores around the house.)

bmciance · February 1

https://community.quicken.com/discussion/comment/20474339#Comment_20474339

Well, even dividends could cause the problem. Good luck!

Jim_Harman · February 1

My first guess would be to look at the share prices.

What types of securities do you hold?

Quicken's quote provider usually has the day's mutual fund prices by 7:30 pm Eastern time on days the market is open but the FI may update the prices at a different time. The Quote/Price column in an Investing > Portfolio view will have a little clock icon if no price has been downloaded for today. Hovering over the clock will show the last day the price was downloaded.

Another thing to check would be the Real time quotes option at Edit > Preferences > Investments. If this is checked, quotes downloaded while the markets are open will supposedly be more up to date, but it also downloads prices from after-hours trading, which are often significantly different from closing prices. Another issue with the Real time quotes option is that if it is checked and you have securities with blank tickers that are enabled for quote downloading, it supplies the price for the first ticker symbol alphabetically in your security list that has the Download Quotes box checked, often AAPL.

mshiggins · February 1

Scrooge McSquirrel, could this be the cause of the discrepancy?

https://community.quicken.com/discussion/7959754/ending-balance-in-account-list-includes-reminder-transactions

Rocket J Squirrel · February 1

My first guess would be to look at the share prices.

What types of securities do you hold?

Yes, I will have to make a project of that this weekend. I hold MFs, ETFs, bonds, CDs, and one stock. Nothing exotic. About 28 holdings in 6 accounts so it will be a project.

Another thing to check would be the Real time quotes option

Good point. QWin keeps enabling this option and I keep disabling it. Just eyeballing the balances today (Saturday), the numbers are closer than they were during the trading week, but still off by more than rounding could explain.

Scrooge McSquirrel, could this be the cause of the discrepancy?

No, I have no reminder transactions.

markus1957 · February 1

Use Tools>Online Center, Compare to Register for each account. That will cause a pop-up window showing any discrepancies between shares reported by the FI & shares recorded in Quicken as well as verifying that cash balances match between them.

As mentioned, out of date share prices should easily show up in the Investment tab.

Make sure when you look at the MS website you are looking at market value totals for the holdings only. The MS top line number includes accrued interest for bonds. In any case this project is not a sufficient excuse to get out of chores, since it should only take about 10 minutes to accomplish. 😉

Rocket J Squirrel · February 1

Compare to Portfolio doesn't exactly work. QWin says everything matches even when my eyeballs tell me that's not the case. Compare the unit prices and total market values below.

Fidelity:

Quicken:

q_lurker · February 1

The compare to portfolio feature only compares share quantities, not prices.

What is Fidelity’s source for the $34.12? I see closing value for Fri 1/31/25 at the $33.53 level. Even after-hours close of $33.31 per Yahoo-Finance doesn’t explain it.

Rocket J Squirrel · February 1

@q_lurker I think you put your finger on it.

The compare to portfolio feature only compares share quantities, not prices.

Thanks, I didn't know that.

What is Fidelity’s source for the $34.12? I see closing value for Fri 1/31/25 at the $33.53 level.

I don't know why Fido is showing this. Look at this other display from Fido's site showing 2 different prices for yesterday, 1/31/25. Several things look wrong.

Rocket J Squirrel · February 1

It appears Fido is getting that erroneous price from XNMS, the NASDAQ National Market System. The positive dollar gain and negative percent gain are truly strange.

bmciance · February 1

Those are quotes which include after hours trades. What you should have is the closing price on 1/31 of $33.53 which is listed near the bottom

Rocket J Squirrel · February 1

I guess that answers my question. Thanks for the responses.

Boatnmaniac · February 1

I can't speak to anything regarding ML but one of the more common causes of total value discrepancies with Fidelity accounts has to do with the MMF that used as the Core Account. If you don't know which MMF you have as your Core Account, log into your online Fidelity account and click on the Positions tab. The first security in the list there is usually the Core Account. Click on that to see what the ticker is for the MMF being used as the Core Account.

Then on the Balances tab, you will see that the value of this Core Account is reported as Cash.

Since Fidelity downloads the value of the Core Account as the Cash Balance you do not want to see anything in your Holdings for that MMF in your account in Quicken. If that MMF is even listed in the Holdings in Quicken then you have an issue that needs to be resolved or it can cause very significant total account value issues. Over time that can very easily amount to tens of thousands of dollars in account balance issues.

Another thing that can help to identify if this MMF might be the source of the total value issue: Click on the Cash Balance on the right below the account register. Do the amounts reported by Fidelity and in Quicken match? If not, then it indicates that this Core Account MMF issue could be the culprit.

BTW, in most cases is there is a Core Account issue in Holdings, Reconcile Shares will not usually identify it as an issue. Not sure why that is.

Rocket J Squirrel · February 1

Handling cash is something Fido does right, at least in my accounts. My core fund is SPAXX. It appears when it pays a dividend, but share count never rises above zero.

Jim_Harman · February 1

Per Morningstar, 34.12 is the 12 Noon price for QCLN on 1/31. It is quite thinly traded - only 61,700 shares for 1/31 - so there is often a significant spread between the Bid, Asked, and NAV prices.

Also I have noticed that with some ETFs, the closing price Quicken records alternates between the closing NAV price and the price of the last trade of the day. For most ETFs, the difference is only a few pennies. but it makes Quicken's market value not match the FI's.

For an extensive discussion of price discrepancies on Quicken's end, see

https://community.quicken.com/discussion/7943682/daily-stock-price-updates-not-working-right

Boatnmaniac · February 1

https://community.quicken.com/discussion/comment/20474436#Comment_20474436

Great. Div transactions just dump the cash into the cash balance. Fidelity handles Core Account "cash" correctly for me, too….at least most of the time.

On a side note: Did you get the notice that Fidelity is going to be changing all the Core Accounts from the current MMFs to FCASH? It sounds like they'll be phasing it in between Feb and Jun of this year. The 7-day yields for the MMFs (like SPAXX) have been running of late a little over 4%. FCASH's 7-day yields have been running at a little over 2%. So, we're going to be losing ~2% (nearly 50%) of our returns on the Core Account. Seems like a Fidelity money-grab to me and I'm not happy about that.

It was explained to me that the current Core Account MMFs are mutual funds so the cash from distribution orders and to finance other securities buy orders that are placed is not really available until after the markets close. FCASH is also a type of mutual fund but works more like a traditional bank sweep account in that the buys and sells occur nearly instantaneously. For most investors FCASH is not really needed. But I've heard it is day traders and the institutional investors who really want it because when they want to place orders they want the cash available for it real time so the buy orders can be executed immediately. If this is the case, it means we little guys get the shaft once, again.

Rocket J Squirrel · February 1

I have not been notified about FCASH. Are you a (wink wink) "private client", @Boatnmaniac ?

Have you heard this, @NotACPA ?

bmciance · February 1

I have FCASH in my Fidelity brokerage account. The MMFs weren't presented as an option for that account. My other 3 accounts with Fidelity (Traditional IRA, Roth IRA and HSA) all use FDRXX. I don't typically keep a whole lot in cash anyway Although in my Roth I have been doing some short selling of Put options lately which requires me to keep some cash on hand so that will be disappointing to lose some yield there.

That was the one big benefit Fidelity had over my accounts at Schwab. WIth Schwab you need to manually buy and sell the MMF if you want to keep your cash somewhere to earn some yield. Are there any other brokers that still do the automatic sweep of excess cash to the MMF?

Yes , it is correct that we little guys always get the shaft!

Boatnmaniac · February 1

https://community.quicken.com/discussion/comment/20474459#Comment_20474459

Here is the notification I received from Fidelity:

They tried to make is sound like they are doing me a favor by making this change but taking away 2% of my Core Account returns certainly is not doing me any favors.

BTW, I used to be a Fidelity private client but I wanted them to manage my accounts portfolio as a UMA instead of managing each account individually. About 2 yrs ago, after 3 yrs of requesting them to put together a UMA proposal for me and getting nowhere I gave up and contracted with Churchill Management to manage my portfolio. Churchill uses Fidelity to hold the investments and do the transactions so I'm still with Fidelity in a manner of sorts but I rarely directly interact with them anymore and they took away all my private client privileges and benefits. But I still download into Quicken from them since they continue to hold the accounts.

Jim_Harman · February 1

Are there any other brokers that still do the automatic sweep of excess cash to the MMF?

Vanguard automatically sweeps cash to their Federal Money Market fund, which is currently paying 4.29%. Another option is their Cash Plus account, which is FDIC insured and has Bill Pay and access to Venmo and PayPal, but does not currently connect to Quicken. Cash Plus currently pays 3.65%.

Vanguard's trading platform is pretty basic though.

markus1957 · February 1

FWIW, my Cash Plus account is connected to Quicken. You're right, it is very basic, but meets my needs.

Chris_QPW · February 2

What I have taken to is just "self-manage" this and just buy/sell to VUSXX. It is a mutual fund, so you have to plan ahead, and it isn't my "checking account", but it works for me. Note I'm using Chase, but these days matters little where the funds you pick come from.

Jim_Harman · February 2

@markus1957 I am surprised to learn that the Cash Plus account is working with Quicken as a settlement fund. There were discussions as recently as October indicating that people were having trouble with it. Were there any tricks to set it up?

markus1957 · February 2

https://community.quicken.com/discussion/comment/20474479#Comment_20474479

Withdrawals and deposits are cleared from the Cash Plus holding like a settlement account. You stated it "does not currently connect with Quicken." It connects fine but has a few quirks.

Funds can be moved between Vanguard accounts as long as the accounts have the same owner. A limited set of Vanguard MMFs can also be held in the account. The cash portion does have the common MMF issue of downloads sometimes being treated as cash and sometimes as a holding. Until Vanguard fixes it, you do have to manually edit some of them.

I set up the Cash Plus account with a linked checking account in Quicken so I can track projected cash flow in the account and keep the cash/settlement portion funded as needed. I've also elected to treat the cash as a holding so I can view the projected income in the Investment tab. If Quicken was able to show projected income from cash in the Investment tab, I'd probably switch to treating it like cash.

Bob_L · February 3

I gave up on cash plus as I tired of fixing wrong quicken transactions. Also the downloads for cash payments (ach) do not include the name of the payee! As I reported on other threads here my rep ran my concerns (well documented examples of their errors included) about quicken issues up the flag pole to no avail. Vanguard just wants the account management business now and could care less about people who manage their own account.

NotACPA · February 3

https://community.quicken.com/discussion/comment/20474459#Comment_20474459

Just now saw this. I'm in the Private Client group at Fidelity, and I didn't receive that notice. Hadn't heard anything about such until I ran across this thread.

We have 6 accounts at Fido, all of which currently hold cash in some amount … large amount in my taxable, smaller amounts in the other 5. My wife's RIRA shows "FDIC Insured Deposit Sweep", the other 5 all read "Held in Money Market".

My 2 IRA's have combined less than $5 in cash. The "other" taxable account receives dividends, but I immediately move them to my main account. Her taxable account holds less than $500 cash.

SO, hell if I know what the criteria for MMF vs other is.

NotACPA · February 3

I just signed into Fido as-if I was my wife. I can see her accounts via MY login, but can't change anything from my login.

I clicked on the CASH label in her RIRA and was presented with the option to "Change Core Position", which I changed to FDRXX.

Those with non-MMF core positions might give this a try.

bmciance · February 3

https://community.quicken.com/discussion/comment/20474736#Comment_20474736

Wow, that was easy! Thanks. We'll see if they force the change back to FCASH in the coming months.

Boatnmaniac · February 3

You might want to read this article about what Fidelity has been doing starting last year regarding FCASH. This is one of several other similar articles about this subject: https://www.thinkadvisor.com/2024/11/27/fidelity-to-switch-advisor-custody-accounts-to-fcash-as-only-core-sweep-option/ .

What really caught my attention:

It looks like this FCASH conversion will affect taxable brokerage accounts only, not other types of accounts. If so, that greatly limits the scope of the impact for me since most of our portfolio is in various IRA and Roth IRA accounts so it would be a financial hit of only a few hundred dollars per year. Much less than I was thinking it would be.
Fidelity appears to be entering a mine field regarding this. Other brokerages who have done this have been hit with lawsuits from customers claiming that they have been enriching themselves at their customers' expense (that "money-grab" thing I mentioned earlier).
It also sounds like perhaps their higher net worth customers might be able to get an exception to this change by requesting their financial advisor to manually designate their cash to be held in a MMF (like SPAXX, FDRXX and a few others designated for people with a lot more wealth than I have).

I haven't called Fidelity yet to discuss this but I plan to later this week after I calm down a bit. 😏

Investment account market values disagree with FIs

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