Category: EquityStat Tips

‘Tis the Season For Dividends and Capital Gains

Posted on | by equitystat

As year-end dividends and capital gains distributions arrive, you can easily track them using EquityStat’s portfolio manager.

With EquityStat’s powerful stock portfolio manager, handling these critical financial events across all your brokerage accounts is seamless and intuitive.

How to Record Distributions

Add dividend, short-term capital gains and long-term capital gains to your EquityStat stock portfolio.
Transaction Panel Example

1. Select the investment from your portfolio list.
2. In the Transaction panel, click the Add button
3. Use the Activity dropdown to select the distribution type:
a. Cash Payments – Select Dividend, Short-Term Capital Gain, or Long-Term Capital Gain
b. Reinvestements – Select the “Re-Invested” version of these options if the funds were used to purchase more shares.
4. Enter the distribution details and click Add.

Add dividend, short-term capital gains and long-term capital gains to your EquityStat stock portfolio.
Example of entering a short-term capital gain.

How to View Your Dividend Totals
Knowledge is power. EquityStat helps you get a complete picture of dividends:

  • Customize Your View: Instantly see the Total Dividends (including capital gains) paid by each investment. Simply access the Options menu at the top and select Change Columns to add this key metric to your main portfolio display.
  • Analyze Your Entire Account: Get big-picture insights on your total income over time. The Analyze Portfolio page, found under the Tools menu, provides comprehensive, graphical performance metrics for your entire account or specific portfolios, helping you make better-informed decisions.

Alphabet/Google Dividend

Posted on | by equitystat

On June 17, 2024, Alphabet (GOOGL/GOOG) will pay a $0.20 dividend per share. This is the first dividend paid by Alphabet in the history of the company.

With EquityStat’s stock portfolio manager, it is easy to add and track your dividends.

To add a dividend to your Alphabet investment, first select this investment in your investment panel. Then in the transactions panel, click the Add button to add a new transaction.

Add dividends to your EquityStat portfolio.
Alphabet dividend transactions example

Next, select either Dividend or Re-invested Dividend from the Activity drop down. If you didn’t re-invest the dividend, just enter the dividend amount in the Total field.

Add Alphabet dividend to your EquityStat portfolio.
Add Alphabet dividend transaction example

If you re-invested your Alphabet dividend, choose Re-invested Dividend from the Activity drop down. Enter the number of shares you purchased in the Quantity field and enter the price you paid for the shares.

Add a re-invested Alphabet dividend.
Add a Re-invested Dividend example

Once you have entered your dividend information, click the Add button to save the dividend transaction to your portfolio.

You can follow many of these same steps if you have a different investment that pays a dividend.

NVIDIA Stock Split in EquityStat

Posted on | by equitystat

Nvidia’s (NVDA) stock is set to split on June 7th, 2024. It is a 10 for 1 stock split. So, for each share you own before the split, you get 10 shares.

If you owned Nvidia (NVDA) stock before the split and you are tracking this stock in your EquityStat portfolio, how do you record the split?

First, select the Nvidia stock in your investment panel. Next, in the transaction panel, click the Add button to add a new transaction. In the Activity drop down, choose a “Split” transaction. Enter how many shares were split, in this case it is a 10 for 1 split, and click the Add button to save the transaction.

EquityStat split Nvidia stock.
Nvidia stock split transaction

When the split transaction is saved, each transaction will be adjusted to reflect this split. The number of shares will be increased ten times and the price will be divided by ten.

For example, if you had the following transactions before the split.

Nvidia transactions before the split in EquityStat stock portfolio tracker.
Nvidia transactions before the split.

After the split your transactions will look like this.

Nvidia transactions after the split in EquityStat stock portfolio tracker.
Nvidia after the split

Notice that before the split there were two buy transactions. After the split, the number of shares has increased 10 times and the price has been reduced by a factor of ten. For example, the initial buy on 07/21/2021 was for a quantity of 200 shares. After the split, the purchased quantity is 2000 shares. The price the shares were bought on 07/21/2021 was $186.12. After the split, the price paid was $18.61. These adjustments are all automatically done when you enter the split transaction.

If you have other stocks that have split, you can use the same steps to record your split. Just make sure that you enter the correct split information.

2023 8949 IRS Tax Form Released

Posted on | by equitystat

We just released the 2023 8949 IRS tax form.  IRS Form 8949 is a form that reports your short and long term gains/losses for any sold investments in the tax year.  If you had any investment sales in 2023, this form is a great way to easily calculate your losses/gains from this investment sale.

To generate Form 8949 click the Tools menu and choose the “Generate Form 8949” menuitem. On the “Generate Form 8949” page, click the Generate button. Your short-term and long-term gains/losses on any investment sales will then be calculated. Then a pdf format of IRS Form 8949 will be generated. This form has a short-term gains/losses section and long-term gains/losses section, which is what you need when filing your taxes.

Calculate your gains/losses on any stock sale with EquityStat and generate IRS Form 8949.
IRS Form 8949 Example

Once this pdf form is generated, you can then send this pdf file to your tax preparer or print a copy of it.

New Feature in EquityStat’s Stock Portfolio Tracker

Posted on | by equitystat

We have added a new feature to our Stock Portfolio Tracker application. When you enter a new stock/investment or add a new transaction for an existing stock/investment, the price of the investment is automatically displayed in the Price field. The price that is displayed is the closing or current price for the date of the transaction. If this price is not correct, you can override the price by entering the correct price.

This feature was designed in case you don’t know the exact price you purchased or sold a stock for, the price is automatically filled in for you and you don’t have to look it up. If you do know the exact price, you can override the filled in price with the correct price.

EquityStat Stock Portfolio Tracker New Feature - Auto Price
Example of Auto Price

For example, if your purchased Apple stock on January 12, 2023 the price of $134.56 will automatically be filled in since this was the closing price on January 12th. If you purchased Apple for a lower or higher price, you can edit the price to the correct price.

This feature also comes in handy when you want to see what price a stock was trading for a past date. Just select the stock, enter the date and you will see the price for that date.

2022 8949 IRS Tax Form Released

Posted on | by equitystat

We just released the 2022 8949 IRS tax form.  IRS Form 8949 is a form that reports your short and long term gains/losses for any sold investments in the tax year.  If you had any investment sales in 2022, this form is a great way to easily calculate your losses/gains from this investment sale.

To generate Form 8949 click the Tools menu and choose the “Generate Form 8949” menuitem. On the “Generate Form 8949” page, click the Generate button. Your short-term and long-term gains/losses on any investment sales will then be calculated. Then a pdf format of IRS Form 8949 will be generated. This form has a short-term gains/losses section and long-term gains/losses section, which is what you need when filing your taxes.

Calculate your gains/losses on any stock sale with EquityStat and generate IRS Form 8949.
IRS Form 8949 Example

Once this pdf form is generated, you can then send this pdf file to your tax preparer or print a copy of it.

EquityStat Stock Portfolio Tracker An Alternative to Morningstar Legacy Portfolio Manager

Posted on | by equitystat

If you haven’t heard, Morningstar’s legacy stock portfolio manager is going away. If you were a previous user of Morningstar’s legacy portfolio manager and want a better alternative, consider EquityStat’s portfolio manager.

EquityStat is simple and easy to use and just works. It was developed by investors for investors.

With EquityStat’s stock portfolio manager, you can track all of your stocks accounts in one place. You can easily see the value of your entire portfolio, as well as the current gain/loss your portfolio. In addition you can see calculations for each individual investment (stock, mutual fund, ETF) such as today’s gain/loss, the percentage gain since you owned the investment, the investment’s realized gain, the stock’s annualized return and many other calculations.

EquityStat also displays all of the transactions for each investment in your portfolio. You can easily add, edit and delete any of these transactions. You can import these transactions into your portfolio by either manually entering them or importing them from a spreadsheet.

In addition you can create multiple portfolios, see performance graphs of your investments and analyze the holdings of your portfolio.

Analyze your stock portfolio
Example of EquityStat’s Portfolio Analyze Page

If you need help importing your Morningstar Legacy portfolio manager into EquityStat, contact our support staff here.

If you are a Morningstar legacy portfolio manager user and disappointed to see it go, checkout EquityStat!

Tesla Stock Split in EquityStat

Posted on | by equitystat

Tesla’s (TSLA) stock split on August 25, 2022. It is a 3 for 1 stock split. So, for each share you own before the split, you get 2 shares.

If you owned Tesla (TSLA) stock before the split and you are tracking this stock in your EquityStat portfolio, how do you record the split?

First, select the Tesla stock in your investment panel. Next, in the transaction panel, click the Add button to add a new transaction. In the Activity drop down, choose a “Split” transaction. Enter how many shares were split, in this case it is a 3 for 1 split, and click the Add button to save the transaction.

EquityStat split Tesla stock
Tesla Split Transaction

When the split transaction is saved, each transaction will be adjusted to reflect this split. The number of shares will be increased three times and the price will be divided by three.

For example, if you had the following transactions before the split.

Tesla transactions before the split in EquityStat stock portfolio tracker.
Tesla transactions before the split.

After the split your transactions will look like this.

Tesla transactions after the split in EquityStat stock portfolio tracker.
Tesla transactions after the split

Notice that before the split there were two buy transactions. After the split, the number of shares has increased 3 times and the price has been reduced by a factor of three. For example, the initial buy on 10/25/2018 was for a quantity of 200 shares. After the split, the purchased quantity is 600 shares. The price the shares were bought on 10/25/2018 was $52.39. After the split, the price paid was $17.46. These adjustments are all automatically done when you enter the split transaction.

If you have other stocks that have split, you can use the same steps to record your split. Just make sure that you enter the correct split information.

Google Stock Split in EquityStat

Posted on | by equitystat

Google’s (GOOG/GOOGL) stock is scheduled to split on July 15, 2022. It is a 20 for 1 stock split. So, for each share you own before the split, you get 20 shares.

If you owned Google (GOOG/GOOGL) stock before the split and you are tracking this stock in your EquityStat portfolio, how do you record the split?

First, select the Google stock in your investment panel. Next, in the transaction panel, click the Add button to add a new transaction. In the Activity drop down, choose a “Split” transaction. Enter how many shares were split, in this case it is a 20 for 1 split, and click the Add button to save the transaction.

Add a split transaction in EquityStat's investment portfolio tracker.
Adding a split transaction in your EquityStat stock portfolio tracker

When the split transaction is saved, each transaction will be adjusted to reflect this split. The number of shares will be increased twenty times and the price will be divided by twenty.

For example, if you had the following transactions before the split.

EquityStat transactions for Google (GOOG) before the 20 for 1 split
Google transactions before the split

After the split your transactions will look like this.

EquityStat transactions for Google (GOOG) after the 20 for 1 split
Google transactions after the split

Notice that before the split there were three buy transactions. After the split, the number of shares has increased 20 times and the price has been reduced by a factor of twenty. For example, the initial buy on 7/14/2021 was for a quantity of 20 shares. After the split, the purchased quantity is 400 shares. The price the shares were bought on 7/14/2021 was $2641.65. After the split, the price paid was $132.08. These adjustments are all automatically done when you enter the split transaction.

If you have other stocks that have split, you can use the same steps to record your split. Just make sure that you enter the correct split information.

Refresh User Interface For Mobile Phones

Posted on | by equitystat

We have recently refreshed the user interface of your EquityStat portfolio on mobile devices. The user interface now looks, feels and works like a mobile app. If you have ever used the Weather Channel App or the ESPN App on your mobile phone, EquityStat works very similar.

To view your EquityStat account on a mobile phone, open up the phone’s web browser, go to www.equitystat.com and login to your account.

EquityStat stock portfolio tracker on a mobile phone.
Example EquityStat Account on a Mobile Phone.

You will then see a list of all your portfolios at the top. You can swipe left at the top to scroll through all of your portfolios. Tap a “portfolio box” to see the investments in each portfolio.

To see details about a specific investment, tap the symbol for the investment. To view metrics about a specific investment tap the price button. Continue tapping the button to cycle through all of the investment metrics.

To add a new investment to your portfolio, tap the plus icon.