currency linked to a stock

[John Ralls]

> On Dec 17, 2014, at 2:53 PM, Sébastien de Menten <sdementen at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> On Yahoo! Finance, there are multiple symbols for Yahoo! Inc in function of the exchange (YHOO for Nasdaq, YHOO.BA <http://yhoo.ba/> for buenos aires, YHO.DE <http://yho.de/>. For XETRA,...). 
> Should all these "stocks" be the same commodity in GnuCash (with then multiples prices in function of the currency) ? Or should they be different commodities (with different namespaces) ? And if I have a brokerage account to trade stocks, can I buy the yahoo stock on Nasdaq and sell it back on XETRA ? Or should I be a bank/trader to be able to do that ? (I haven't gone farther than sell/buy stock to/from the same exchange for my personal use)
> I thought there would be different stocks in GnuCash and that a stock would have a single currency. Now, the example of the Cheddar is a bit stretched as it looks more similar to "I buy a house in CAD and sell it back in USD" (ie it could be considered as an asset/account and not as a commodity).
> If one was to manage import/export of goods in multiple currencies (ie not through an exchange), would it use "commodities" to do so in GnuCash (one commodity per type of cheese (or type of electronic material or type of clothes) ?

These are user questions, so I’m transferring the thread to the user list. Please be sure to reply there.

In theory, yes, the different symbols represent different prices on the same security. In practice if you want to use Finance::Quote you’d need to make them separate securities because GnuCash can handle only one symbol and price source per security for online retrieval. GnuCash is probably not the right software for someone engaged in forex/stock arbitrage anyway. That said, if you’re willing to enter the prices by hand you certainly could enter prices in as many currencies as you like via the price editor.

Whether you can do the arbitrage with your brokerage account depends on your account. It’s my understanding that one can trade on foreign exchanges with Charles Schwab, though I’ve never tried. Talk to your account representative. But be aware that forex is an excellent way to make a small fortune — out of a big one.

Houses are different from cheeses in that they’re not often moved and that professional assistance is generally required to convey them. Cars, on the other hand, are often sold across the US/Canadian border and are an expensive enough asset that one might record it in GnuCash, especially if one bought them on credit.

Regards,
John Ralls