[GNC] Dealing with mutual funds

[Michael or Penny Novack]

On 11/9/2024 6:58 AM, Boniforti Flavio wrote:
> \
> *USD Dividends*
> You're right, it was not at the right place. I moved it under "Income".
> When I get paid dividends, how should I register this transaction? Do I
> increase both the "Income:USD Dividends" and the "Assets:IBKR:USD Cash"
> accounts?

The last sentence indicates you should defer asking about more 
complicated issues until after you have gone back and redigested 
"fundamentals of double entry bookkeeping". Use either the gnucash 
tutorial or a more comprehensive "accounting/bookkeeping 101".

You just asked SHOULD I enter a transaction with at least two accounts 
affected with total debits equaling total credits << more or less the 
definition of a valid double entry transaction >>

YES --- both ......USD Dividends and ,,,,,,,,,, USD Cash are increasing 
by the amount of the dividend. but their SENSE is opposite, The 
account.....USD Dividends is an increasing credit (credit is the usual 
sense of an account of type income) and ...USD CASH is an increasing 
debit (debit being the normal sense of an account type asset).

If it bothers you that both amounts are "positive" STOP. The senses are 
not "positive" and "negative" but "debit" and "credit" with all numbers 
positive. Double entry bookkeeping developed before Western mathematics 
accepted negative numbers. The only operation is addition because "a 
number plus a number is a number" is true but "a number minus a number 
is a number" is not true as long as "a number" means a positive number.

Michael D Novack