Software for managing investment portfolio

RD69

I'm at the limits of what I can do with my spreadsheets. 6 (soon to be 7) different accounts, ISA, SIPPs and others etc. I'm sure there are people here in a similar position.

What software do you use to manage your portfolio?

I don't mean the fund supermarket/brokers web site, I mean something that can help consolidate everything into a single picture. In particular I'm interested in forecasting income and comparing it against actuals.

There are several packages picked up by a Google search, but they all appear to be for the US market, and I'd prefer a UK focus.

Thanks

colsten

I use AceMoney, a near 100% clone of MS Money. A lot of people here still use MS Money even though it's been out of support for some time. Both can manage a huge number of accounts - in fact, I don't know that they have any limit.

MS Money is free to download now and needs some add-ons to pick up stock and fund prices. AceMoney costs $39.99, works a treat w/o any add ons, there's a 30-day trial version, and it's fully supported.

cloud_dog

I use last free UK version of MS Money 2005. You can get it free here, together with MSMoneyQuotes.

Linton

colsten wrote: »

I use AceMoney, a near 100% clone of MS Money. A lot of people here still use MS Money even though it's been out of support for some time. Both can manage a huge number of accounts - in fact, I don't know that they have any limit.

MS Money is free to download now and needs some add-ons to pick up stock and fund prices. AceMoney costs $39.99, works a treat w/o any add ons, there's a 30-day trial version, and it's fully supported.

I hadnt heard of it before - thanks.

I am struggling setting up investments copying over a massive amount of MS Money Data. The main problem at the moment is downloading fund prices using the FT source - they come up as 0. Do you use AceMoney for investments?

colsten

Yes I do use it for investments. You have a number of sources for stock and fund prices. I have to use different sources for different funds for some unknown reasons but I have yet not had a problem finding a source that works for the funds I am interested in. Probably best to have a play with the trial version to see whether it suits you.

pafpcg

I'm still using a spreadsheet (MS Excel97*) albeit using the multiple worksheet facility, importing data (a weekly snapshot of equity prices) manually from ft.com. Until last year I used to do a cut-and-paste of a list of equity prices from Morningstar until I found that FT could also display the prices of two obscure OEIC funds held in our old PEP accounts (yup, nearly twenty-five years old); the FT system allows me to set-up a "watchlist" of equities and to download the list on demand to a CSV (comma-delimited) spreadsheet. (Note: the FT watchlist occasionally confuses by listing "The City of London Investment Trust" under either "T" or "C", so when I open the downloaded file, my first step is to sort the contents into A-Z sequence of the LSE Symbol code. There are other sources such as HargreavesLansdown and I subsequently found those 'missing' OEICs on Morningstar, but the FT is sufficient for me.)
The next step is to copy the list of equity prices from the downloaded spreadsheet into a 'prices' worksheet within the "master" spreadsheet. The 'frontpage' worksheet displays a list of all our equity holdings (30-odd in total) divided-up into certificated shares, holdings with electronic brokers, ISAs and SIPPs. Each row shows the equity with the number of shares held and it automatically calculates the value of the holding using the equity's price per share using the value in the 'prices' worksheet, with subtotals for each category for copying into a weekly log held in another subsidiary worksheet.

Obviously, the holdings need to be manually updated when a purchase is made, but the weekly snapshot process is very quick - little more than a minute or so. It works for me!

*[I find that Excel97 gives me all the facilities I need for day-to-day spreadsheet work without the bloat of later versions and it's so much faster. For really big spreadsheets, I use LibreOffice's Calc.]

Heedtheadvice

Undoubtedly there are specialist software apps that are designed specifically for investments/finance all with their pros and cons.

However the OP surprised me greatly saying ".....At the limits of what I can do with my spreadsheets....". Excel is very powerful and can link to and use huge amounts of data...And can be set up to meet individual needs or implement analysis that may not be available on ready made programs.

As has been posted above CSV files can be downloaded and these can be automatically imported by Excel, collated analysed and presented, compared to planned income and find solutions to reallocations of investments to rebalance if things are going too far from plan.
Pafpcg does a copying process but even that is not necessary.

What is it that you wish to do that you currently cannot? I might be surprised but I would almost put money on it that you can do it with Excel - or other workbook programs; there are others but if you already have Excel....

RD69

Thanks for your comments.

Let me clarify. I’m not at the limit of my ability with spreadsheets, I am at the limit of the amount of trust I would place in them. Whatever the implementation (Excel, LibreOffice, Google Apps), using a spreadsheet for anything non-trivial introduces a certain amount of risk.

See http://www.eusprig.org/ for some background, or search Google for “Spreadsheet Disadvantages” or similar.

To summarise, from my point-of-view as a software developer, a Spreadsheet is in effect a programming system which entirely lacks any of the mechanisms that have been developed to support programming systems.

No real schema, no normalisation of data, no interactive debugging, no version control, no unit testing etc. Whilst it is possible to emulate some of these features with disciplined management – I would not trust myself, or any third party to produce an error-free spreadsheet of any magnitude.

It is my suspicion that many of the “productivity issues” facing businesses are caused by the reflex to use spreadsheets to solve a business process problems because they are “cheap” and “easy to use” but they are in-fact usually full of errors and actually end up costing more to fix the ensuing mess, and repair the effect on the bottom line.

“What is it that you wish to do that you currently cannot? I might be surprised but I would almost put money on it that you can do it with Excel”

“In particular I'm interested in forecasting income and comparing it against actuals.”

Take a portfolio of equities and produce a monthly calendar that forecasts the total dividend income for the next 12 months.

If you’ve got Excel, you’ve probably also got Access (a database). Try comparing how you would implement the equity forecast solution in both.

In fact, that’s what I did. I don’t much like Access, but I realised it would only take a couple of hours and it would be “good enough”. I tried MSMoney but it kept calling up the mothership to deliver personalised adverts, and it didn’t appear to have an answer to my equity forecast problem.

Regards

Linton

RD69 wrote: »

..........
I tried MSMoney but it kept calling up the mothership to deliver personalised adverts, and it didn’t appear to have an answer to my equity forecast problem.

Regards

Use the UK final version as given in cloud-dogs posting. There are no adverts. The lifetime financial modelling facility is OK (I used it to confirm my retirement plan) but far from being perfect, particularly for handling UK tax. If you need your own detailed forecast I dont see any alternative to a bespoke spread sheet.

Heedtheadvice

Right! I understand your fears regarding risk now where people use and develop software solutions.

However I would maintain that such risks (and yes there are risks) are not limited to spreadsheets but in fact are widespread especially where development, use or keying is done improperly or by inexperienced people.

You mention for example Access and it also has it's risk associated with keying data or with numerical computations such as the null entry that creates an error in a calculation requiring the developer to be aware of the possibility and use a null to zero conversion. You do not get that in spreadsheets.

You cite that study but the vast majority of not all of the cases (that I read) were down to human error and that can happen anywhere! Such a "frustrating," Kelley said yesterday. "I hate when we make mistakes. People are human and they do make mistakes, but I hate it." for one conclusive comment.

Let's turn this discussion around. I am aware of many spreadsheet systems that effectively reduce risks and locate errors introduced by human intervention or the lack of it such as one in particular that monitors requested appointments for urgent cardiac patients, locates this where no action has been taken or where the planned appointment is outside requirements and flags them up. Thus saving lives - not just a few pounds!

Honestly even with version controlled software errors can be introduced and it is the systems and actions surrounding them that create quality.

Why do you think you cannot version control a spreadsheet, track and record or limit change or analyse the processes to find errors?
Surely you should call your thread "reliable people for managing portfolios?"
Non of the other products mentioned have probably not gone through a change to correct......'Software errors'.....

Or do you believe they have been always perfect?
Cheers:beer:

RD69

Right! I understand your fears regarding risk now where people use and develop software solutions.

I don't think you do. Your post appears to defend an opinion that spreadsheets are ok because all systems are prone to operator error.

Now, I agree all systems are prone to operator error but it does not follow that developing non-trivial solutions with spreadsheets is ok.

And risk is only one concern. For complex software solutions, I'd be more interested in long-term maintainability. For my portfolio forecast problem, when I re-balance next year, will I look at a spreadsheet or a database? Where shall I find the schema for the data? (These are rhetorical questions.)

Let's turn this discussion around. I am aware of many spreadsheet systems that effectively reduce risks and locate errors introduced by human intervention or the lack of it such as one in particular that monitors requested appointments for urgent cardiac patients, locates this where no action has been taken or where the planned appointment is outside requirements and flags them up. Thus saving lives - not just a few pounds!

Sounds like the NHS? A single point solution for a problem that is organisation wide. Would've been better implemented on the web for access from thousands of different clinics.

But when the only tool you have is Excel, everything looks like a spreadsheet.

Honestly even with version controlled software errors can be introduced and it is the systems and actions surrounding them that create quality.

I also agree. It's not enough to have development tools, you've got to use them properly and that's a management issue.

But if I version control source code, I can see exactly whats been changed. If I diff two spreadsheets, all I can see is that they differ. (Though I wouldn't be surprised to learn of a third party tool that could do something a bit better.)

Heck I wrote one a few years back...

Or do you believe they have been always perfect?

Not if I write them

What is it that you wish to do that you currently cannot? I might be surprised but I would almost put money on it that you can do it with Excel”

In particular I'm interested in forecasting income and comparing it against actuals.

I'm restating this because I think if you try the dividend forecast problem in Excel (or similar) you may understand the reasons for me giving up using spreadsheets to manage a portfolio.

And... maybe I'm wrong, maybe it can be done, maybe its easy.

Regards