Importing from Quicken

[Steve]

---- Charles Day <cedayiv at gmail.com> wrote: 
> On Sun, Mar 2, 2008 at 2:08 PM, Richard Ullger <rullger at ntlworld.com> wrote:
> 
> >
> >
> > Charles Day wrote:
> > >
> > > That is a good question. I have not tried to enter shorts or covers in
> > > GnuCash. Off the top of my head, it seems like you would need a
> > "Borrowed
> > > Shares:Security Name" liability account for which the underlying
> > "commodity"
> > > (GnuCash term) is the security being sold short. Transfer shares from
> > that
> > > account into your portfolio and immediately sell them. That would be the
> > > short, leaving you with the cash you got from the sale plus a liability
> > of
> > > the borrowed shares.  For the cover, buy shares for the liability
> > account.
> > >
> >
> > When you short shares, your broker borrows the shares on your behalf and
> > sells them. You do not actually realise any cash for the sale so you do
> > not have that cash to go and buy more shares. When you buy to cover you
> > receive the difference between the sale and the cover if there was a
> > gain or your account is debited with the difference if there was a loss.
> >
> 
> Ah, yes, I had forgotten how that worked. Had I actually gotten around to
> shorting ANF a few days ago as I had planned, I would have known better. :(
> 
> Anyway, I'm sure there must be a fairly standard way of recording this type
> of transaction in a double-entry accounting package. If there is not already
> a GnuCash druid/wizard to drive the process, then that would be a nice
> enhancement.

Err.. I'm still not clear on this. Does GC 2.2.3 in fact support shorting stocks.

Thanks,
Steve