Well, it's not so much a tool as a column option (speaking of "Period (Total)"). It would be nice to know what's causing this, but it just isn't that critical.
Remember that the period re-started on 01 Jan, so we're only talking about a few transactions. After writing the longish note below, I did a little more digging, and I'm more puzzled. Since 01 Jan, there have been four transactions: A dividend, and three other transactions. I think that only holdings with transactions this year should change the brokerage balance. All transactions were done at the highest value of the holdings. Thus, I don't understand why the overall brokerage has such a huge hit. I was thinking of perhaps if there was a stock split item and it didn't account for that, and thus, it looked like a huge loss... but not on the year-to-date changes. On Wed, Jan 21, 2026 at 7:05 AM Kalpesh Patel <[email protected]> wrote: > It is more of an opportunity to learn what the tool is doing which IMHO > should be understood if you are going to use it. You don’t want to put your > hand in a lawn mower blades when they are spinning, right? > > > > Did you also considered the transactions in the account itself as part of > that total – possibly on a cash basis (like dividends paid or cash > transferred in or out)? The total shown across the account is some of the > account activities itself, plus all of sub-accounts activities underneath > it rolled-up. > > > > *From:* R Losey <[email protected]> > *Sent:* Tuesday, January 20, 2026 11:46 PM > *To:* David T. <[email protected]> > *Cc:* [email protected]; Kalpesh Patel <[email protected]>; > Stan Brown (using GC 4.14) <[email protected]> > *Subject:* Re: [GNC] Changing from one year to the next > > > > I think we're getting a little wrapped around the axle. > > > > This discussion started when Stan told me about the "Total (Period)" > column that would shows year-to-date totals (I had noted that one reason I > cleared Income & Expense yearly is that I wanted to be able to look at > year-to-date totals in those categories). Stan said that the new column > would show the same thing, and it does for most things -- bank accounts, > cash, Income accounts, Expense accounts, etc. Even individual investments > appear to be correct. However, the parent investment account is WAY off -- > I assume that this is due to something I'm doing and isn't a GnuCash bug. > > > > I don't update prices, so GnuCash only gets price updates when I buy or > sell items in the account (which, of course, includes dividends that are > re-invested) > > > > Having said that, as of 01 Jan this year, let's use the following example: > Ameritrade brokerage account with $5,000 in the sweep fund, and 100 shares > stock A - I received dividends on 31 Dec and the price was $50, so that > stock A was worth $5,000 on 01 Jan. We can assume that there are other > stocks, but as I understand "Total (Period)", it shouldn't matter for this > example. I trust that this is clear so far. > > > > On 04 Jan, I sold a share of stock A for $55 and put the proceeds ($55) > into the sweep fund. So, the sweep fund now has $5,055 and I have 99 shares > of stock A @ $55 ($5445). > > > > (Note that one could assume I purchased a share of stock A at $45 and get > similar numbers). > > > > When I look at "Total (Period)", I see the Sweep Fund showing +55 and > stock A showing -1 STKA, which are both correct, but the Ameritrade > brokerage account shows a -$3,000 amount. I think it should be +500 ($55 > from the sale, and +$445 from the updated price of stock A) > > > > As I understand the Year-to-date value in "Total (Period)", it shouldn't > matter how far out of date the stock value is... it should use the last > known value for the 01 Jan calculation, even if the value goes back to 01 > Aug 2025. If I have made no changes in this year and have not updated > prices, then the Total (Period) should be zero. When I buy or sell > something, everything gets re-calculated based on current price. So, if I > have a lot of shares and the price has changed, even a small buy or sell > could dramatically affect the "Total (Period)", and I assume that this is > what happened. > > > > I had merely commented that I was just surprised to see that the > relatively small changes that I made in the new year (buying and selling > minor amounts of a few stocks) had resulted in a relatively HUGE change in > the brokerage account year-to-date value -- especially because the new year > is only a few weeks old -- and, in fact, the transactions were done on 06 > Jan, which is only the third business day of the month (2nd, 5th, 6th)... > there shouldn't have been time for prices to charge that much from 01 Jan. > > > > I repeat, my original comment was just an expression of surprise to Stan > that the brokerage value didn't seem to make sense; it was not a request to > this fine group to debug the problem, even if there is one. If I get > concerned, I can enter all of the brokerage data and the last time the > price was updated and do my own calculation of change in value. But I'm not > concerned at this moment. > > > > Thanks for reading this rather lengthy explanation. > > > > > > > > On Tue, Jan 20, 2026 at 10:00 PM David T. <[email protected]> wrote: > > I think you would have to explain further how it is that you're > determining that the number is off by that amount. Since you say you're not > updating prices regularly, GnuCash will only show valuation at the last > data point. > > How are you determining your benchmark numbers? Where exactly in GnuCash > are you seeing wrong numbers (CoA, some report, etc.)? Are the share counts > correct? > > I don't know your situation, but a change of 2% (which happened on Tuesday > January 20th) would be off by $10,000 for holdings of $500,000. That's just > in a day. > > David T. > > > > On January 21, 2026 6:21:34 AM GMT+05:30, R Losey <[email protected]> > wrote: > > I didn't say it was a bug -- just that it is not working as expected... but > remember that this is for this year, and there stock price hasn't > fluctuated that much. If it showed a loss of $20 or so, okay, but $10000 > since the start of the year? It COULD be mere price fluctuation (but I > don't update prices -- they just get modified when there is a > buy/sell/dividend action). So... the value being down that much JUST SINCE > 01 Jan seems a little off. > > > > On Tue, Jan 20, 2026 at 4:20 PM Kalpesh Patel <[email protected]> wrote: > > You seeing $10K difference is **NOT** result of this bug I mentioned – > the bug doesn’t display erroneous value once another action is taken -- > like relaunching GNC. > > > > The differential of $10K for Total (Period) is likely resulting from > pricing fluctuation aggregated for all stock sub-accounts within period > set; not just the one you sold. The pricing database stores one price per > security per day which would also impact multiple accounts if that security > is held in multiple accounts. The other possibility is that there is a > chance that one of the security might have a wrong pricing value in the > database that falls within the period being set that is getting used for > the difference calculation. > > > > *From:* R Losey <[email protected]> > *Sent:* Tuesday, January 20, 2026 12:34 PM > *To:* Kalpesh Patel <[email protected]> > *Cc:* Stan Brown (using GC 4.14) <[email protected]>; > [email protected] > *Subject:* Re: [GNC] Changing from one year to the next > > > > I added "Total (Period)" per Stan's information, and the Income, Expense, > and Liabilities all seem to be working correctly. The Assets like bank and > savings account also are correct (they are all in USD). The problem seems > to be with the investment accounts, which have sub-accounts of stock with > various prices; they don't seem to be totaling up correctly. As I don't run > regular quote updates, so the price per share is only updated when there > are transactions in that account. So, it might be related to the bug you > mentioned, especially if it hasn't been fixe yet. I am running the current > version of GnuCash (5.14). > > > > Or maybe it's my understanding: If I sell 100 shares at $10/share (thus > $1,000) of stock A last week and transfer the funds to my cash account, I > expect that the total for the period should be zero, with Stock A losing > 100 shares at $10/share, and the cash fund increasing $1,000. The Total > (Period) shows the decrease of 10 shares, and the increase of $1,000 in the > cash account, but the total for the period shows something like down > $10,000. > > > > > > > > > > > > On Tue, Jan 20, 2026 at 5:42 AM Kalpesh Patel <[email protected]> > wrote: > > I recall a bug/feature in 4.x version where if you changed the accounting > period the COA totals would not reflect new period totals until after > another action is taken -- like update quotes. Also remember that there are > multiple total types (Total, Total(Period), Total (USD) , etc.) in COA so > selecting correct one is also necessary. > > -----Original Message----- > From: Stan Brown (using GC 4.14) <[email protected]> > Sent: Monday, January 19, 2026 8:30 PM > To: R Losey <[email protected]> > Cc: [email protected] > Subject: Re: [GNC] Changing from one year to the next > > > > On Mon, Jan 19, 2026 at 12:41 PM Stan Brown (using GC 4.14) > <[email protected] <mailto:stan%[email protected] <stan%[email protected]>>> > wrote: > > On 2026-01-19 10:18, R Losey wrote: > > There is a end-of-year closeout in which income and expense > > accounts are > > zeroed (by rolling them into Equity). This is not necessary to do > > for > > GnuCash to work, but some people like doing it (I am one that does > > - it > > makes Income and Expense account totals reflect only the current > > year). > > Like you, I zero out income and expense accounts every year. But it's > not necessary to do that to see the totals for the current year. > > That's > > always possible on the Accounts pane, assuming you've set your > accounting period to start and end with the start and end of this > > year. > > (That's in Edit » Preferences » Accounting Period.) > > To show the current period income and expenses in the Accounts pane, > clock the triangle at the extreme right of the headings and tick > > "Total > > (Period)". > > > > On 2026-01-19 13:02, R Losey wrote: > > True, Stan. I do have it set for current year, and that does work for > income/expense... but not for categories under Assets or Liabilities. > > > Are you sure about that? It sure looks to me like Asset and Liability > accounts show the amount of change, positive or negative, in the account > during the current period, just as for Income and Expense accounts. That > equivalence is less obvious, of course, if Income and Expense accounts > start each year at zero. > > For instance, my liability to Wells Fargo was $1073.77 on 2025-12-31 and > will be $724.90 on 2026-01-26. That is a reduction of $348.87, and > Total(Period) shows $(348.87), just as I would expect. > > Stan Brown > Tehachapi, CA, USA > https://BrownMath.com > > > > > -- > > ------------------------------ > > Richard Losey > [email protected] > Micah 6:8 > > > > > > > -- > > _________________________________ > Richard Losey > [email protected] > Micah 6:8 > -- _________________________________ Richard Losey [email protected] Micah 6:8 _______________________________________________ gnucash-user mailing list [email protected] To update your subscription preferences or to unsubscribe: https://lists.gnucash.org/mailman/listinfo/gnucash-user ----- Please remember to CC this list on all your replies. You can do this by using Reply-To-List or Reply-All.
