Transfer of ETF shares

[John Ralls]

> On Nov 17, 2015, at 9:51 AM, blah <mikaelheidrich at gmx.com> wrote:
> 
> I use a method to exchange etf that are co-listed on two exchanges with
> different currencies. Specifically, I buy DLR.TO on the TSX in CAD and have
> my brokerage "journal" them to DLR-U which is in USD and then sell them
> thereby acquiring USD. I can't for the life of my figure out how to do this
> in GNUCASH. Does anyone have some input on how I can set this up in GNUCASH?
> 
> this is the account hierarchy
> <http://gnucash.1415818.n4.nabble.com/file/n4681569/11.png> 
> 
> the 16575.00 CAD in DLR.TO has been "journalled" to DLR.U.TO which is in
> USD. My brokerage indicates that I now have 1250 shares of DLR.U.TO @ 9.92
> usd per share. I have tried the transfer fund dialogue, that didn't do it. I
> have tried to simply buy 1250 shares in the DLR.U.TO @9.92 and have the
> split indicate it comes from the the DLR.TO account and that didn't work
> either. There must be a way to simply transfer 1250 share CAD into 1250
> shares USD but I just can't seem to figure it out. Any guidance will be
> greatly appreciated. I've been using Gnucash for a few months now and have
> managed to find all my other answers by searching, this one eludes me.

You presumably have a money account in your brokerage in each of CAD and USD. Since the DLR.TO and DLR.U shares are equivalent, you can if you like have a single DLR commodity and account and just do the CAD transactions to the CAD money account and the USD ones to the USD money account. If you want the price database to track them separately and maybe to get prices for F::Q, you’ll need to set up separate commodities and accounts for DLR.TO and DLR.U. To transfer between them create a transaction in one account, put it in split mode, and create splits for each account, entering only the shares being transferred in each split (negative number for the split of the “sending” account). Delete the default “1” in the price in each split, and enter nothing in the buy or sell columns. This mirrors the “journalling” entry that your broker does to accomplish the same thing.

Regards,
John Ralls