[GNC] Trading accounts

[davidcousens49 at gmail.com]

Fred,

Not early in the guide, but in the section dealing with multiple currencies
https://www.gnucash.org/docs/v4/C/gnucash-guide/currency_trading_accts.html and
discussed on the wiki (https://wiki.gnucash.org/wiki/Trading_Accounts). 

I don't think anyone has yet written anything about any application to trading
stocks and I don't think they are intended to be applied there. 

It is recommended to read the guide and help manual fully  before using GnuCash.
I didn't, like many other users, but I did have a general accounting background
coming in. You will find a lot of discussion in the mailing list archives re
stock trading and unrealized gains and losses..

If they were mentioned earlier it is likely they would confuse new users with
limited experience of double entry accounting and accounting practice. It is a
compromise to get new users in the door. 

Trading counts are about providing information in the accounts for unrealized
gains and losses involving currency transactions.

It is not normal accounting practice to recognize unrealized gains or losses in
the books as income/expenses and the circumstances under which they may be
recognized in some jurisdictions are likely to be highly variable. They are not
normally taxable until the gains are actually realized in the majority of
jurisdictions. That is why they aren't a default option.

I wouldn't think there is any need to redo past transactions unless the
information re unrealized gains and losses through currency exchange
transactions is necessary for some specific reporting process.

David Cousens

On Tue, 2022-07-26 at 18:46 -0400, Fred Tydeman wrote:
> Over the past several months, I have been importing Quicken data into
> GnuCash.  There is about 6 years of data and lots of transactions.  Besides
> normal income and expenses, that data involved many different stocks and
> many different currencies.  Recently, I saw a reference to "Trading"
> accounts.  I have now enabled that feature.  Based on reading
> https://www.mathstat.dal.ca/~selinger/accounting/tutorial, I believe that
> my old transactions that involve currencies (and maybe stocks and other
> assets whose value varies) were done wrong.
> 
> Do I need to redo old transactions involving currencies?
> Do I need to redo old transactions involving stocks?
> Do I need to redo old transactions involving any assets whose price
> varies?  This probably depends upon the asset, eg. no for Real Estate.
> 
> Is there an easy way to fix the mess I have created?
> 
> Aside:  I do not recall any mention of trading accounts in the Tutorial
> early on when it talked about setting up the Chart of Accounts.

> 
> What is the reason that Trading accounts are not turned on by default?


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