Fwd: Re: Stock sales & balance

[Tim Kynerd]

This message accidentally went only to Conrad Canterford, so I'm 
re-posting it to the list. Apologies for the unnecessary noise (of 
re-posting).

-- Tim

----------  Forwarded Message  ----------

Subject: Re: Stock sales & balance
Date: Fri, 31 Jan 2003 05:14:11 +0100
From: Tim Kynerd <tim at kynerd.nu>
To: Conrad Canterford <conrad at mail.watersprite.com.au>

On Thursday 30 January 2003 23:45, Conrad Canterford wrote:
> On Fri, 2003-01-31 at 01:49, Martin Ewing wrote:
> > This seems to arise from sales of appreciated (or, lately,
> > depreciated) stocks or mutual funds.  I was just doing the
> > "obvious" thing of recording a purchase of xxx shares at yyy
> > dollars and a sale of -xxx shares at zzz dollars.  This balances
> > the number of shares, but unbalances the dollars, because the
> > prices are different.
>
> <snip>
>
> > What to make of this?  Is gnucash just not automated enough (auto
> > CG income)?  Should I just forget about account balance?  Am I
> > missing something?  Is this discussed somewhere in the
> > documentation?
>
> No, it isn't automated, and I don't believe its documented either.
> We've had a discussion on this subject fairly recently, but I don't
> know that any solution came out of it. This unfortunately applies for
> both 1.6 versions and the imminent 1.8.
>
> > I would call this a gnucash bug, because it should not allow me to
> > enter an unbalanced transaction without ringing bells loudly.
>
> Unfortunately, while some developers agree with you, others feel that
> the transaction *is* balanced because its recording shares not money.

Those developers are WRONG.

The fundamental job of any accounting system is to keep track of MONEY,
not shares. It's all about the money. Otherwise, you're doing something
other than accounting.

> I guess that means that the answer at this point in time is that you
> have to accept your balances all being out. Sorry.

BOY, I'm thankful I don't own any shares of stock that I need to keep
track of in GnuCash.

- --
Tim Kynerd   Sundbyberg (småstan i storstan), Sweden   tim at tram.nu
Sunrise in Stockholm today:  8:08
Sunset in Stockholm today:  15:53
My rail transit photos at http://www.kynerd.nu

- -------------------------------------------------------

- -- 
Tim Kynerd   Sundbyberg (småstan i storstan), Sweden   tim at tram.nu
Sunrise in Stockholm today:  8:08
Sunset in Stockholm today:  15:53
My rail transit photos at http://www.kynerd.nu