How do I resolve placeholder entries?

Notes

• Tips about which option to use
  • Enter Missing Transactions to get complete performance reporting and tax planning assistance. You'll need to enter the missing historical transactions for all securities you own.
  • Use the Estimate Average Cost shortcut if you're willing to estimate historical data for this security. Quicken will report approximate values for some performance and tax calculations.

  For more information, see Decide how to resolve placeholder entries.

• Tips about what you see in the Estimated Average Cost dialog

  In the As of field

  Quicken displays the date of your placeholder entry for this security:

  • If you added this account by downloading transactions and holdings information from your financial institution, then this is the date of your first download.
  • If you added this account by manually entering holdings information from a brokerage statement, then this is the statement ending date.

  In the Holdings area of the dialog

  Quicken displays the following:

  • Total shares you own: This is the number of shares you own(ed) on the As of date.
    • If you added this account by downloading holdings information from your financial institution, then this number is from your brokerage's online records.
    • If you added this account by manually entering holdings information, then this is what you owned on the ending date of the statement you used to add the account.
  • Shares from transactions: These are the shares accounted for by any historical transactions you entered or downloaded prior to the As of date.
  • Shares in Placeholder Entry: This is the number of shares represented by a placeholder entry. Whenever the shares entered in historical transactions doesn't equal the total number of shares you own, Quicken either prompts you to enter a Placeholder, or enters it for you. These are the shares that don't have historical cost basis information.
• Tips about what you see in the Enter Missing Transactions dialog

  In the Transactions as of list

  Quicken displays all the historical transactions you've entered or downloaded for this security:

  • Date of the transaction
  • Transaction type
  • Description of the number of shares and the cost per share for each transaction

  In the Holdings as of area

  Quicken displays the following:

  • Total shares you own: This is the number of shares you own(ed) on the As of date.
  • Shares from transactions: These are the shares accounted for by any historical transactions you entered or downloaded prior to the As of date. These are in the transaction list above. As you add historical transactions, the transaction list populates and this number grows.
  • Shares in Placeholder Entry: This is the number of shares represented by a placeholder entry. Whenever the shares entered in historical transactions doesn't equal the total number of shares you own, Quicken either prompts you to enter a Placeholder, or enters it for you. These are the shares that don't have historical cost basis information. As you add historical transactions, the transaction list populates and this number shrinks. When it reaches zero, you've successfully entered all missing transactions as of the placeholder date.
• Tips about tracking cost basis for mutual funds

  By default, Quicken tracks the cost basis for stocks according to the lots you purchased. The IRS allows cost basis for some mutual funds to be tracked on an average cost basis. Use this only to track mutual funds. If you're uncertain as to whether a given security is eligible to be tracked using average cost, contact your tax advisor.

  If you change from lot ID to average cost, Quicken discards the lot information. Back up your Quicken data file before doing this.