Downloading transactions and positions into a new portfolio

[daveholobaugh]

When downloading into a new portfolio (I am a new user), the system uses the same price for calls and puts as it does for the equity itself. What am I doing wrong?

[Mark]

Hi daveholobaugh,

It sounds like you have the underlying stock symbol recorded for your options. Instead, you need to record the option symbol. Visit:

http://finance.yahoo.com

with your web browser. Look up the underlying stock symbol, and then click on "Options" on the left menu, and find the right symbol. Record this symbol in your option investment, under "Investment Properties...". Also, in the "Investment Properties... / Internet Retrieve", set the quote server to "Yahoo (Options)".

[daveholobaugh]

Mark,

I created two USAA portfolios by having the program download all transactions and positions. Both portfolios have similar equity and covered call positions. One shows the correct price for the calls but the other shows gthe same price for the calls as the stock. Everything was done automatically. I made no entries myself. I followed the portfolio wizard each time as shown by the tutorials, and did exactly the same things with each portfolio.

Also, why does it boot up with the new portflio wizard instead of one of the portfolios?

Dave

[Mark]

Hi Dave,

I'm not sure why the 2 different sub-portfolios came up different. If you go into the investment properties, and look at the symbols for your problematic options, what do they show? Are they the options symbols, or the underlying stock symbols?

Did you save your data to a portfolio file (*.mm4)? Use "File / Save Portfolio" and assign a portfolio location/filename. By default this should come back up automatically when you re-start Fund Manager. Do you get any errors when exiting Fund Manager? If for some reason Fund Manager can't save your preferences to the registry, that would cause the New Portfolio Wizard to come up each time, instead of your last used portfolio file.

[daveholobaugh]

Mark,

i did the following:

1. Uninstalled Fund Manager and all data, folders, etc
2. Reinstalled Fund Manager
3. Downloaded from USAA (two accounts) and Fidelilty (one account) their complete history of transactions and positions. This means all for USAA and two months for Fidelity
4. Retrieved prices for 9/30 - 10/1 only. Previously I retrieved prices for two years for USAA and two months for Fidelily

The Fidelity account is correct and it downloaded the correct symbols. Both USAA accounts are incorrect as they both used improper symbols for options.

I then tried to edit the USAA symbols, but was unable to find out how to do so. However, after thinking about it, I don't want to do that forever, and I know that USAA did download the correct option symbols before.

Question, what would cause Fund Manager to take incorrect option symbols some of the time?

Question, is there a way to edit symbols in Fund Manager?

Question, does the time period of price requests make a difference? Before I used two years and now I used one day.

Dave

[Mark]

Hi Dave,

Question, what would cause Fund Manager to take incorrect option symbols some of the time?

When retrieving transactions/positions from your broker, the symbols are provided by your broker, and FM uses these. If you'd like to verify what symbols your broker is reporting for your options, you can look at the log file after retrieving an account. For help on finding the log files, read the very bottom of this page:

http://www.fundmanagersoftware.com/tintrtv.html

I'd look in the "xmldump.txt" file, and search for SECLIST. This section is reporting the symbols and names for each CUSIP. All of the transactions and positions are reported by CUSIP, but then there is a lookup table to report the symbols and names in the SECLIST section. The format is pretty self explanatory if you look at it in a text editor.

Question, is there a way to edit symbols in Fund Manager?

Yes. Right mouse click on the investment, and open up the "Investment Properties..." dialog. You can edit the symbol here.

Question, does the time period of price requests make a difference? Before I used two years and now I used one day.

It would only make a difference in terms of the prices retrieved. Retrieving prices does not modify your recorded symbols.

[daveholobaugh]

Mark,

Is there anyway for me to have Fund Manager retrieve prices using cusips instead of symbols? Are there any data bases that do that? Wouldn't that solve my problem?

Dave

[daveholobaugh]

Mark,

I edited the option symbols for the current positions and retrieved prices again including historical prices after saving all investments and portfolios. There was no change. Fund Manager is still showing prices for the options to be the same as for the equity.

I am getting very frustrated. Maybe this is why I did not use it the first time. I don't remember the reason, but I do remember frustration.

I have emailed USAA about providing proper symbols, and expect a response in a few days. However, I wish I had not uninstalled and deleted everything becauses one USAA account loaded properly once.

Any suggestions?

Dave

[daveholobaugh]

Mark,

What file does FM use for symbols when retrieving prices? It is not the investment files as none of them contain the symbol form for options used by Yahoo (no matter whether USAA or Fidelity) and no matter how the symbol is edited the results are the same. FM has to be using another file for price retrieval.

Also, I think I am having trouble saving portfolios and investments. Supposedly they are saved on exit as those blocks are checked, but I also click on the icons before exiting. Do I have to do that for each portfolio separately? And in the FM folder created by FM in My Documents only one of the portfolios is listed but when I open that portfolio all three are listed as subporftfolios under the master portfolio. Why? What am I doing wrong?

By the way, I have gone through all tutorials. And while I acknowledge being old and somewhat senile, I am computer literate and I have a BS and MBA. I know I am not stupid but I am beginning to feel otherwise.

Dave

[Mark]

Hi Dave,

Is there anyway for me to have Fund Manager retrieve prices using cusips instead of symbols? Are there any data bases that do that? Wouldn't that solve my problem?

If you retrieve transactions from your broker, prices will also be updated. Only current prices are available here, but it will update pricing, based off your CUSIP. Retrieving prices from any quote server sends the request using the symbol property of your investment.

I edited the option symbols for the current positions and retrieved prices again including historical prices after saving all investments and portfolios. There was no change. Fund Manager is still showing prices for the options to be the same as for the equity

Can you give me an example symbol, and quote server you're using that didn't update? There is no source for historical option prices, only current option prices are available from Yahoo (Options). Let me walk through an example, maybe this will help. Visit Yahoo with your website and look up the underlying stock symbol. I use INTC for this example. Then, click on "Options" on the left menu. You will see the symbol for all the INTC options listed here. For example, INTC101016C00014000 is the symbol for INTC Oct 2010 14.000 call. So, go into Fund Manager and find the option investment. Right mouse click on it, and choose "Properties..." to open the Investment Properties dialog. On the "General" tab, set the symbol to INTC101016C00014000. On the "Internet Retrieve" tab, set the quote server to Yahoo (Options). Click OK. Now, retrieve prices by clicking "Edit / Internet Retrieve / Prices". This should update your option quote for the last trading day. To verify, go into the Data Register (Edit / All Data...) and set the Data Type to "Prices". Here you will see all your recorded pricing data. Look at the most recent price.

What file does FM use for symbols when retrieving prices?

Fund Manager doesn't use a "file", it requests the quote for the symbol investment property. All investment properties, pricing, and transaction data are all stored in the *.dat investment file. See the detailed example I wrote in the above example.

Also, I think I am having trouble saving portfolios and investments

There are 2 types of files used by Fund Manager. Investments are stored in *.dat files. There is one *.dat file per investment. The second type of file is the portfolio *.mm4 file. The portfolio file contains all your sub-portfolios, which investments are in each sub-portfolio, and many of your other preferences, such as which windows are open, etc. You generally only have a single *.mm4 portfolio file, and as many sub-portfolios in there as you want.

If you still have troubles retrieving your option pricing after reading this, please tell me an example symbol you are using, and what quote server you are retrieving from.

[daveholobaugh]

Mark,

Please tell me the files you need to analyze this situation and I will email them to you (I will need your email address). Doing what you last said to do did nothing. I must admit that I am not computer literate enough to solve this.

If you want to work directly on my machine and have the capability to do so, I will authorize it and do what has to be done on my end. I wish you could walk me through this thing, I and would pay the price to do so. Can you do that?

My gut tells me that if I can learn how to use it, Fund Manager will do what I want done.

Dave

[Mark]

Hi Dave,

Why don't we do a quick web conference, where I'll connect to your computer, and we can work on it together on your computer, with your data. Please call the office on Tuesday or later this week. We are available from 8am - 5pm PST. The number is 602-492-3491. All you will need is a high speed internet connection, like cable or DSL.

[daveholobaugh]

Mark,

I will call Tuesday.

Thanks.

Dave

[DogNo1]

Hi. I am trying to do the same thing with my three different USAA accounts. My first problem is where to find the ability to import your entire investment history from USAA including Positions and transactions. I can't find any where to download my activity to an OFX or QFX file any farther than 18 months back. Even the 18 months of transactions that I do import into Fund Manager are missing all positions that were purchased later than 18 months ago. I'm having nightmares about weeks of laboriously entering all of my data by hand.

I would really appreciate it if you could point me to the right place to download my complete investment history from USAA dating back to 1999 and then give me some pointers about how to import them into Fund Manager successfully. Since my Microsoft Money Plus will stop working on January 31, 2011, I need to have another program in place by then.

Any help will be MUCH appreciated

[daveholobaugh]

All of my USAA transactions posted, but none were before about 7/1/2008. I suggest you call USAA and ask how far back your transactions are available. Why do you need to record transactions over five or ten years old? Do you still hold some of those positions? If so, all you would have to post are those you still hold. True?