Unrealised losses

Wm... tcnw81 at tarrcity.demon.co.uk
Thu Nov 26 22:31:59 EST 2015


Fri, 27 Nov 2015 09:38:17 <565789D9.4090205 at iinet.net.au>
Peter <p.hoban at iinet.net.au> wrote...

>
>Peter <p.hoban at iinet.net.au> wrote...
>>> >I am using GnuCash 2.6.1 on Linux Mint 17.2 to manage a superannuation
>>> >fund with >$1.5M funds.  Annual reporting in Australia requires a
>>> >figure for Unrealised Gains/Losses which I see from reading the Forum
>>> >posts is a rather complex issue.
>> Depends if you're used to doing the basic sums yourself, of course.

>I confess to a handicap - I was an engineer not an accountant and there 
>has been a significant learning curve to mount.

Not an issue, you're likely to be good at working through a problem and 
the maths itself shouldn't be challenging.

>> >I am left with the question of EOFY reporting which is required to show
>> >unrealised gains/losses - I can ensure that the Price Editor has an
>> >appropriate value for the stock on the balance date but the Balance
>> >Sheet shows the acquisition price when the price source is set to
>> >'average value'.  When the source is set to 'Nearest in time' the
>> >Balance Sheet shows a value much larger and clearly incorrect. It
>> >appears something is not set up right.
>> I'm hoping I'm stating the obvious.
>>
>> You want two balance sheets.
>>
>> The first  is end of previous financial year using Nearest in time
>> The second is end of last     financial year using Nearest in time

>In an endeavour to remove any historical errors I deleted all prior 
>years from the data file. (The former file is preserved of course.)

Good, playing safe is healthy :)

>So the data has opening values equal to the audited balance sheet on 
>that date.  The EOFY balance sheet (nearest in time) shows a value for 
>Unrealised Losses but I cannot calculate the same value.

I'm not sure I understand that.  Do you have an Unrealised Losses figure 
on a balance sheet GnuCash is producing or are you trying to match a 
GnuCash report to one someone else has produced? See note below [1]

>>> >Can I get an accurate asset value into the Balance Sheet, and an
>>> >accurate Unrealised Gain for a periodic revaluation?
>> Comments and queries if the above doesn't help:
>>
>> Q1: do you have holdings in currencies other than the fund's home
>> currency?
>Only parcels of shares - no other currencies.

OK.

>> Q2: do you have prices in Tools / Price Editor for any securities on the
>> dates (or very soon before) required for the balance sheets?

>Yes, well!!  I find a dogs breakfast.  Clearly I have work to do to set 
>this right.
>At this time my only suggestion is that the price editor show either 
>the date or the price (or both) on the line of each entry - at present 
>it shows only the name of the security which is the same on every line 
>and only repeats the name at the top.  That makes it slow to find which 
>are the prices to be removed as each item has to be opened then closed 
>again to know before deleting.

The transaction details (i.e. buying or selling some shares) have a 
price, quantity, etc. and define how many of something you have.

The info in Tools / Price Editor is for valuing however many shares you 
have at a point in time, extra prices don't affect things.

>Thank you Wm for your suggestions.

[1] just to separate out this point in case someone else is following. 
It is unclear to me if P is trying to get an existing Unrealised Loss 
into a GnuCash book (in which case Equity would seem the sensible route) 
or if 2.6.1 has an Unrealised Loss on the Balance Sheet which has got 
lost (arf!) in development, in which case where did it come from as I 
think in 2.6.9 it would be called Retained Losses.  I'm not sure if we 
are at version cross-purposes or not.

-- 
Wm...



More information about the gnucash-user mailing list