Suggestions on handing for futures trading entries

jasonb885 · January 2

Hi,

I've been dabbling in futures trading, and at Schwab, an entered and exited futures position intra-day shows up as a "Sweep to Futures". This can be a realized gain or a realized loss.

Any suggestions on how best to handle this?

Thank you.

NotACPA · January 2

Why don't Buys and Sells of appropriate securities work?

And, assuming you continue, Q isn't really designed for high volume trading, and don't be surprised if you start running into problems.

jasonb885 · January 3

https://community.quicken.com/discussion/comment/20530210#Comment_20530210

Because it shows up as just a deposit with a "sweep" memo. It is a deposit/withdrawal transaction. There's no security entry as a buy/sell. This seems to be how Schwab codes intra-day futures positions that open and close the same day.

NotACPA · January 3

SO, you haven't tried recording Buys and Sells, even though they ARE securities transactions? Is that right?

And, what's the specific problem with what's downloading?

jasonb885 · January 3

It doesn't download as a securities transaction. Schwab transmits it as a Payment/Deposit for the totality of the futures positions entered and exited for that day. One trade or 50, one commodity or 50. If I'm in and out intra-day, I get this transaction for my net that day.

So I'm curious if there's some useful way to categorize this since I'll have either a debit or credit for the day. Is it an Income category on winning days and an expensive category on losing days? Maybe that's the best way to track it. I don't know, so I thought I'd ask.

Thanks.

jacobs · January 3

I'm curious if there's some useful way to categorize this since I'll have either a debit or credit for the day. Is it an Income category on winning days and an expensive category on losing days? Maybe that's the best way to track it.

I wouldn't use two different categories for the days with gains and the days with losses; I would pick income or expense based on what the typical grand total is over a year. So if it's generally an expense, then use that, and the days with gains will have a "negative expense".

Is Quicken making the Payee name "Sweep to Futures"? If so, you can create a QuickFill rule for this Payee name and assign it the category you select, so all your similar transactions will automatically be categorized to the same, correct category.

NotACPA · January 4

And just what is this "Futures" account at Schwab? Is it cash only, which you seem to be suggesting, or is it an investments account that holds the actual trades?

And why can't you setup in Q an (if necessary, Offline) account to hold the actual trades? Wouldn't you need/want that info for tax reporting? OR, you could follow @jacobs suggestion that will give you the $ totals

jasonb885 · January 10

So this is just a regular brokerage account, with futures trading approved. Because of the nature of how futures contracts work, these are marked to market daily. So there's this kind of cash adjustment transaction that Schwab seems to use for this purpose. I've only ever held intraday, so no investment buy/sell transactions are included in the feed. Just this cash sweep.

I wasn't going to try to track the P/L or anything in Quicken, or try to use any of this for tax purposes. I just want to categorize this in some way, so that my account cash balance reconciles with my brokerage cash balance, and it might be a deposit or withdraw depending on whether the position closed for a profit or a loss.

Was just curious what others might be doing for this mark-to-market "sweep" transaction that Schwab includes in its feed for a brokerage account when a trade of this type, opening and closing a futures contract intra-day, occurs.

Thanks.

Suggestions on handing for futures trading entries

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