How do I manage information about my securities?

To track securities with Banktivity, you must first create an investment account and then add investment transactions to record the shares you own. Once investment transactions have been recorded, you can monitor the performance of your holdings using the Portfolio and Investment reports. To manage general information about your securities, such as assigning risk levels, downloading the latest quotes, and checking historical prices, click "Configuration" in the sidebar, then click "Securities." The securities list will appear to the right:

Add a security

Click the plus (+) button at the top of the security list, and enter details for the security in the sheet that appears:

• Name: The full name of the security.

• Symbol: The ticker symbol used to identify the security. Banktivity uses this symbol to download quotes for the security via the Internet. A suffix may be added to the symbol to specify which exchange should be used to retrieve quotes (for example, .L suffix will lookup quotes for securities on the London Stock Exchange). A symbol is required even when the security is not listed on a public exchange; in this case, enter anything that will distinguish the security for reporting purposes, such as "PRIVATE_BOND1," "PRIVATE_CD2," etc.

• Type: The kind of security this item represents. Banktivity will retrieve quotes automatically for Stock, Mutual Fund, ETF, Index, and Other securities when you click the "Update" button on the toolbar. Prices for other types of securities must be entered manually (see below).

• Par value: The face value of the bond. This setting only appears if you choose the "Bond" type.

• Contract size: The number of shares underlying each option contract. This setting only appears if you choose the "Stock Option" type. In the US, the standard contract size for stock options is 100.

• Risk: The level of risk involved with holding this security, ranging from the relatively low-risk "inflation hedge" to the comparatively high-risk "growth" option.

• Currency: The currency in which the security is traded. This is typically determined by the exchange used to trade the security: for example, the New York Stock Exchange only trades in USD, whereas the Munich Stock Exchange trades in EUR. Be sure to choose the appropriate currency so that the security is valued correctly in your investment reports. For more information about managing currencies, see Multiple Currencies.

  When "British Pound Sterling" is chosen, another option will become available to determine whether the security is traded in pounds or pence. In most cases, Banktivity will set this automatically the first time you download quotes for the security. You can override the default setting by changing it, deleting the security's price history, and downloading quotes again.

• Notes: Any additional information about the security that you want to record for future reference.

• Do not fetch quotes for this security: Check this box to disable quote downloads and record prices manually for this item (such as when the security is not traded on a public exchange). This setting only appears if you choose a type that Banktivity can download quotes for.

You can also create a security by adding a transaction to an investment account and typing in a symbol for the new security. Banktivity will recognize that the security has not been recorded yet, and will ask you to configure it using the same screen pictured above.

Add a watchlist item or index

Even if you don't own any shares of a particular security, you can still add it to the securities table in order to track it as a watchlist item - simply follow the same steps described above to add the security. The only functional difference between a watchlist item and an active security is that the latter has investment transactions associated with it. Both types of securities are displayed the same way in the securities list.

To track stock indices such as NASDAQ or the S&P 500, add a security as described above. Enter the name of the index, and be sure to enter a '^' symbol in front of the index's ticker symbol (for example, "^IXIC" or "^SPX"). Select the "Index" type before you click "Create." Indices appear in the securities list alongside your active securities and watchlist items.

To hide watchlist items and indices from the securities list, check "Only show securities you currently hold" at the top of the list.

Download quotes for your securities

Click the "Update" button on the toolbar, or choose File > Subscription > Update Security Prices in the main menu. Assuming you have an active connection to the Internet, Banktivity will look up all of your securities and download the latest quote for each one. When available, the price history for each security will also be downloaded (see below for more information). Any securities for which quotes cannot be downloaded can be updated manually by editing the price history.

Edit the details of a security

Select a security in the securities list, then click "Edit" in the navigation bar. A sheet will appear to let you change its settings. Any modifications you make will automatically be applied to the investment transactions associated with the security. The currency cannot be changed, so if a mistake was made with the currency setting, a new security will need to be added with the correct currency.

View and edit a security's price history

When a security is selected in the table, a chart will appear at the bottom of the window to show the price history for that security:

Each data point on the graph consists of three lines representing four bits of information for a particular day: the horizontal tick on the left indicates the security's opening price, the vertical line indicates the high and low prices, and the horizontal tick on the right indicates the closing price. Click on one of these data points to view the exact figures to the left.

To edit the price for a particular date, simply click the data point you want to modify or type in the date, then adjust the Open, Close, High, and Low figures as needed. For any securities for which Banktivity cannot download quotes automatically, you should enter prices in the history graph on a regular basis. Banktivity will use these prices when determining the value of your investment accounts and generating investment reports.

To update the security's price history by downloading quotes, click the gear button below the price fields and choose "Download Quotes Since Last Year" or "Download Quotes Since Last Transaction." To update all securities at once, simply click the "Update" button on the toolbar.

To delete a single price from a security's history, click that data point on the graph or enter the date of the price you want to remove. Click the gear button below the price fields and choose "Delete Selected Price," then confirm that you want to delete the selected price.

To clear the entire price history for a security, select the security in the list, click the gear button below the price fields, choose "Delete All Prices," and confirm the deletion. The next time you download quotes, Banktivity will fill in the price history if it is available.

Delete a security

If you no longer want to track a security, select it in the list and click "Delete" in the navigation bar. If the security has any investment transactions associated with it, Banktivity will alert you that those transactions must be deleted before the security can be removed.