How to remove a stock from my portfolio that has zero shares

Lakedaisy
Lakedaisy Member ✭✭✭
edited June 2018 in Investing (Mac)
Mac Quicken Premier 2018 Ver 5.4.4

I haven't owned shares of this stock for about 10 years.  But somehow a zero share line item seems to have appeared.  I can't figure out how to remove it. I tried adding 1 share and removing 1 share, but this appears as owning 1 share or negative one share.  Any suggestions are appreciated. 

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Quicken user since 1986

Comments

  • Quicken Harold
    Quicken Harold Alumni ✭✭✭✭
    edited April 2018
    Hi Lakedaisy, appreciate your question.

    To remove a stock from your portfolio, you can search for the stock and delete the transactions that coincide with it.

    I would search by Security/Payee in Quicken for Mac:

    image image

    Hope this helps.

    Respectfully,
    ~ Quicken Harold.
    Quicken Harold
    Community Moderator
  • RickO
    RickO SuperUser, Mac Beta Beta
    edited January 2018
    You probably have some residual very small fractional share that the database thinks you still own due to rounding.

    As Harold says, if you don't need the transaction history, you can just search for and delete every transaction involving this stock.

    If you need the history for some reason, you could export or print those transactions and save separately and then delete. Or you could try adding or removing very small fractional shares and see if you can hit on the amount that will zero it out.

    Also, small possibility that a placeholder transaction is affecting Quicken's ability to show this as zero. See this:

    FAQ: What Are Placeholder Transactions in Quicken for Mac?
    Quicken Mac Subscription; Quicken Mac user since the early 90s
  • Lakedaisy
    Lakedaisy Member ✭✭✭
    edited January 2018
    Thanks Harold and Rick.  I tried comparing the file with a file a few days earlier that didn't have the error.  Could find no difference in the transactions for this stock.  Tried deleting the transactions, but that changed my account value considerably and I didn't want to add a dummy transaction to adjust the balance.  Finally, just restored a backup from a couple days ago and updated the missing transactions. Everything appears fine again.

    I do have a question though.  I see no reason to keep transactions from 8-10 years ago.  Is there a way to delete old transactions without changing the account balances?  Or is there anything similar to Year End Copy as in the Windows version?  Thanks.
    Quicken user since 1986
  • RickO
    RickO SuperUser, Mac Beta Beta
    edited January 2018
    Lakedaisy said:

    Thanks Harold and Rick.  I tried comparing the file with a file a few days earlier that didn't have the error.  Could find no difference in the transactions for this stock.  Tried deleting the transactions, but that changed my account value considerably and I didn't want to add a dummy transaction to adjust the balance.  Finally, just restored a backup from a couple days ago and updated the missing transactions. Everything appears fine again.

    I do have a question though.  I see no reason to keep transactions from 8-10 years ago.  Is there a way to delete old transactions without changing the account balances?  Or is there anything similar to Year End Copy as in the Windows version?  Thanks.

    There is no Year End function in the Mac version.

    When you delete buy and sell transactions there will be a net cash difference that will require that you enter a balance adjustment to keep the cash balance of the account correct. But it's pretty easy to know what that number needs to be. Before deleting the transactions, just select them all and the total of the cash involved (positive or negative) will be displayed in the upper right of the register for the selected transactions. 

    Make note of the number and the current cash balance. Then delete the buy/sell transactions and enter a new Payment/Deposit transaction with Category "Balance Adjustment" using the number you noted above. You can put something in the memo like "cash adjustment for deletion of XYZ stock transactions". Then check that the cash balance of the account has not changed.

    Add/Remove share transactions being deleted will not require a cash adjustment as there is no cash involved in these transactions. Neither will Reinvest Div/Int transactions. Any Income or Dividend transactions will require a adjustment if you choose to delete them (which I would do separately from buys/sells).
    Quicken Mac Subscription; Quicken Mac user since the early 90s
  • Lakedaisy
    Lakedaisy Member ✭✭✭
    edited January 2018
    Lakedaisy said:

    Thanks Harold and Rick.  I tried comparing the file with a file a few days earlier that didn't have the error.  Could find no difference in the transactions for this stock.  Tried deleting the transactions, but that changed my account value considerably and I didn't want to add a dummy transaction to adjust the balance.  Finally, just restored a backup from a couple days ago and updated the missing transactions. Everything appears fine again.

    I do have a question though.  I see no reason to keep transactions from 8-10 years ago.  Is there a way to delete old transactions without changing the account balances?  Or is there anything similar to Year End Copy as in the Windows version?  Thanks.

    Got it.  Thanks Rick
    Quicken user since 1986
  • jacobs
    jacobs SuperUser, Mac Beta Beta
    edited January 2018
    Lakedaisy said:

    Thanks Harold and Rick.  I tried comparing the file with a file a few days earlier that didn't have the error.  Could find no difference in the transactions for this stock.  Tried deleting the transactions, but that changed my account value considerably and I didn't want to add a dummy transaction to adjust the balance.  Finally, just restored a backup from a couple days ago and updated the missing transactions. Everything appears fine again.

    I do have a question though.  I see no reason to keep transactions from 8-10 years ago.  Is there a way to delete old transactions without changing the account balances?  Or is there anything similar to Year End Copy as in the Windows version?  Thanks.

    Lakedaisy: if those old transactions aren't causing you any serious problems, and you don't want to jump through the hoops that @RickO described to manually remove them, you might just want to leave them for awhile. There have been a lot of requests to purge old data, and my guess would be that the developers will get around to adding this feature at some point in the future. This is a low-priority need, and there are lots of higher priorities that are preventing users from doing things they need in Quicken Mac 2018 -- but I'd expect it's on the future development wishlist for somewhere down the road. So if you don't mind living with the old transactions, maybe wait a year to see if this function gets added to the Quicken Mac product.
    Quicken Mac Subscription • Quicken user since 1993
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