GNUCash Import QIF - Help Please!

[Edward Doolittle]

On 6 July 2015 at 00:47, GT-I9070 H <gti9070h at gmail.com> wrote:

> 2015-07-05 13:20 GMT-04:00 Wm <wm+gnc at tarrcity.demon.co.uk>:
>
>
> >   What I think you do is this:
> >>  Buy X100 for Y50 and then reprice everything you buy in X in terms
> >>  of Y.
> >>
> >> Yeah. Now I have X100 for spending. When I spend all X100 I will have
> >> spent all Y50.
> >>
> >
> > This is an extremely simplistic view and probably only works if you only
> > or mainly work in cash.
>
> "probably"?
> Or works or does not work. Nothing needs to be complicated to work, if it
> works better if it is simple. Geniality is work with simply.


GTI, there is a difference between "simple" and "simplistic". Your view of
currency exchange is not rocket science, so it is simple, but it neglects
important considerations, which makes it simplistic.

>
> > I, and I expect most other people here, have access to credit and foreign
> > currency accounts.  Essentially I am saying many of us don't carry great
> > big wadges of real live cash around in our pocket most days so the USD or
> > YEN in my pocket changes value over time to me.
> >
> > Dunno about anyone else but I can't afford the bodyguards for lots of
> cash
> > these days!
>
>
> Any commodity can be treated like that. Everything has its purchase price,
> its valuation price and the selling price.
> Only are real transactions that have been completed. If the purchase of the
> currency has been performed, then the purchase price is real. The valuation
> price is just a "valuation" that serves to determine the selling price. You
> will only have the REAL selling price after you make the sale before that
> these prices are hypothetical and not real.
>
> I prefer to work with the purchase price (REAL PRICE), would you rather
> work with the valuation price (HYPOTHETICAL PRICE).
>
>
> GTI, the purchase price is only "real" at the moment of purchase. It
doesn't
continue to be real for an indefinite time afterward. The only real things
in all
of this are the transactions. I paid X dollars Canadian to get Y dollars US:
all that matters as far as accounting goes are the X and Y. Price is an
abstraction. Now if I start buying things in US dollars, the transaction I
record
is "Z US dollars for lunch". To translate that back into Canadian is to me
nonsensical. Perhaps what I bought simply cannot be purchased in Canadian
dollars. Perhaps the exchange rate is fluctuating wildly. Perhaps I made
several purchases of US dollars at different prices: then is my exchange
rate some kind of average? Or am I paying with the oldest US dollars first?
Or the newest?

You say you ignore valuation price, which may be fine for you, but if I
were to
find that my Y dollars US had suddenly doubled in valuation I would be
tempted to do something about it: "rebalance" or something of that nature.
Unless I misunderstand, your proposed system neglects that kind of
situation.

>
> >  What we have here is a simple and common transaction between two
> >> different currencies AND an exchange rate, so I record X, Y and the
> >> rate.
> >>
> >
> > But the rate isn't true as it will have changed.  You're fooling yourself
> > and, I think, this is why no-one else wants to do this.  It is weirdly
> > artificial, people know you're fooling yourself so why formalise it.
> >
>
> You is that this fooling yourself.
> Only are REAL transactions that have been COMPLETED, PERFORMED, MADE,
> EXECUTED, TERMINATED. Valuations (floating rates) are speculations.
>

I agree that real transactions are the only ones of interest. And the only
transactions
that have been completed in my example above are Y USD for X CAD and then
lunch for Z USD. Those are the only transactions that should be recorded.
In fact,
they are the only transactions that are recorded in GnuCash, which means
it's working
exactly as it's supposed to. The price business is artificial. I certainly
have no interest
in struggling with your proposed system when there is something better, and
as you
say REAL already. Just record the transactions then figure out a way to
generate
whatever reports you want. I will generate a different set of reports for
my transactions,
and we can both be happy.


> > You should investigate the currency XXX with which gnc allows you
> > (relatively) open exchange, it might suit you as an intermediate
> currency.
>
>
> I've looked and did not serve me.
>
>
>
> >   Until you get some more of X at a slightly different rate at which
> >>  point the same snack now costs Y.54132
> >>
> >> No, maybe Yes. I spent all the X money in your rate (1/2), buy more
> >> X money in your new rate and follow spending. eg. X=Y*1/3.
> >>
> >
> > This is where your model collapses, unless you maintain cash amounts in
> > varying currencies which, if I recall correctly, was what you didn't want
> > to do.
>
>
> We buy and sell none, one or several currencies and not see any problem in
> controlling my stock of merchandise (currency).
> I do not know if my model is perfect, but it certainly did not collapse
> anywhere yet.
> if I spend Y100 I will pay with Y50 (rate: 1/2) more Y50 (rate: 1/3) where
> X = Y50 *1/2 + Y50*1/3 (split). This is a REAL transaction.
>
> If you want to do these kinds of calculations, no one can stop you, but
they
are not real. You have to make an arbitrary decision about how to value the
commodity if you have made multiple purchases. Oldest first, newest first,
or
some kind of average (of which there may be many). You also have to keep
a record not only of how many Y you have, but also how many you purchased
in each transaction in the past. Not so simple any more.


>
>
> > When I asked for your help in this thread I meant a way to *import*
> >> transactions WITH off-line exchange rate from an Excel spreadsheet
> >>
> >
> > OK, I'll say it is not possible.  You wanted an answer, now you have one
> > and a why...
>
>
> To strengthen: Are you saying that GnuCash can not import offline exchange
> rates from Excel or any other place because of this approach to
> multicurrency we discussed here now?
>
>
> GnuCash imports transactions. Prices and everything you discussed can be
calculated given the transactions. Go ahead and write routines to calculate
and
report what you want. There's no need to import prices because they can be
calculated. No?

If prices could be imported it would open the door to inconsistencies (what
if
the calculated price is different from the recorded price?) and would
require a
different number format (rational numbers rather than decimal fractions). A
huge mess for what is (in my opinion) no gain whatsoever.

-- 
Edward Doolittle
Associate Professor of Mathematics
First Nations University of Canada
1 First Nations Way, Regina SK S4S 7K2

« Toutes les fois que je donne une place vacante, je fais cent mécontents
et un ingrat. »
-- Louis XIV, dans Voltaire, Le Siècle de Louis XIV, Chap. XXVI