[GNC] "Capital Loss" is Expense or Income account ?

[Adrien Monteleone]

Record it in the income account.

Some people keep both a Capital Gain *and* a Capital Loss account. But you really only need the Capital Gain account for most purposes. (your local laws may require both however)

With one account, both gains and losses are recorded in that same account. Gains will be credits to the account (since it is an Income account), Losses will be in the form of debits to the account. (reducing the gain) The balance at the end of your accounting period (usually one year) will determine if it is finally a gain or loss.

Note, this would be “realized” gains or losses because you are recording them specifically, not having GnuCash estimate what they might be. (which would be ‘unrealized’)

Regards,
Adrien

> On Apr 11, 2020 w15d102, at 7:15 AM, Long <Phamhoanglongvn at outlook.com> wrote:
> 
> GnuCash Documents :
> https://www.gnucash.org/docs/v3/C/gnucash-guide/currency_invest1.html
> - 12.5.2. Selling a currency investment
> "you must account for the profit (or loss) as coming from an Income:Capital
> Gains account (or Expenses:Capital Loss)"
> ---------------------------------------
> Because in GnuCash Documents, it's only guided people how to record realized
> Gains, not Realized Loss. So i posted this to find some help.
> 
> Should i create "Expense" Account to record Realized Loss OR record it as
> negative amount into "Income" Account ?
> 
> Thanks in advance.