Hi Evan,
The figure reflected as Capital under my Portfolio overview does not tally with the sum of the past years of annual net amt tabulated in Portfolio => Transaction => Summary. I added this net sum of each year for the past 4 years and somehow it falls short of the Capital reflected under the main Portfolio Overview page.
The discrepancy of abt 15% amting to abt $30k seems quite a lot considering i only do a handful of trades each year and I do include brokerage fees as cost. Also seems a bit much if its due to FX adjustment. Is this reflected Capital amount not just a sum of all S$ amt coverted from my mostly HK and US shares? Or could it be due to some dividends recording that made the difference. Maybe I didnt do something right. 
Would you be able to advise where would this difference be coming from? Checked with another friend and she also says there is a difference in hers but its only abt 2 %. But this time her reflected Capital is lower . Unlike mine. But she only started her portfolio in Dec 2019. Hence the lower discrepancy.
Cheers.
Hi Elmer,
Sure. Let me try to answer the question as precise as I can.
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“The figure reflected as Capital under my Portfolio overview” => This is basically Current Cost in your case and Current Cost is simply how much you paid for each stock that you are currently holding.
Note: They are converted to SGD using either FX you have provided or the FX on that day given by StocksCafe FX provider.
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As such, they will not tally annual net amount list in Portfolio => Transaction => Summary. These amount included closed positions.
Let me try to summarize. Yes, these amounts are not expected to tally because they are measuring different things. Capital measures your Total Current Cost whereas Portfolio => Transaction => Summary Net Amount measures the flow of money (i.e. Did you buy more or did you sell more)
Let me know if you have follow up questions.
Cheers,
Evan
Ahhh ok. That totally makes sense. Sorry for the confusion.
What I was actually trying to do was to find out how much $$amt I have periodically actually pumped into my portfolio ( nett of any profits ) in total. This would also include any sale of stocks but only including the earlier invested cost.
I realised that taking the Current Portfolio Value - Overall Profit + Div ( Closed+ Current ) would not work as the Current Portfolio doesnt capture trades that were closed out earlier.
Perhaps if i had a bank account that was solely dedicated to this investment account it would make it easier to calculate.But unfortunately I did not do that. Would you have any suggestion how I can do that even manually? Or would Stocks Cafe even have a feature for this aldy?
Anyway 4 years into using SC and I continue to be impressed with the info we can extract from it. Good stuff indeed ! Cheers
No worries at all. This is where I need to think how to make the terms/explanation more intuitive.
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You can check out the Capital Flow here → https://stocks.cafe/portfolio/report
Capital Flow → amount of capital that is being injected or withdrawn from your portfolio. (Note: Dividends collected are considered as capital withdrawn)
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Actually, “Current Cost - Closed P&L (+Div)” would give you your initial capital net of all sale of stocks and dividends
Thnks Evan for your reply. From 2. it looks like the formula would be
Initial Capital = Current Cost - Closed P&L + ( Sale of stocks and div )
Is there anywhere in the site I can look for the Sale of stocks and Div aldy tabulated or do I have to manually add up all the sales of stocks + Div ( this is aldy automated ).
Also by Initial Capital I am refering to any additonal funds periodically being added from my bank account for stocks purchases. Any proceeds from sales of stocks/P&L/Div would go into the Cash Holdings component of my Portfolio which if redeployed again later to buy more shares , would not be considered Initial Capital.
Basically what I am trying to check is
Eg
Over 4 years I have periodically invested $X + $Y + $Z . During this same period there have also been various Buy/Sells but no additional $ injections. $X + $Y + $Z would be what I defined as Initial Capital and is what I am trying to find out here. Hope this Initial Capital definition is along the same line as the formula given by you. And which I am trying to see if I need to manually add up the Sales to derive the answer . Cheers.
Basically, I believe what you are looking for is this then
Initial Capital = “Current Cost” - “Closed P&L (+Div)” - “Current Positions Div”
Note: All the above terms can be found in Portfolio Overview page → https://stocks.cafe/portfolio
Let me explain each term.
Current Cost => This give you what is the current capital outlay for the current positions.
Closed P&L (+ Div) => This will give you your sale of stocks (e.g. If you buy a stock at 10 and sell at 12, closed p&l = 2 so by reducing that, you are taking into consideration the proceeds). Also, need to take into consideration dividends collected by closed positions
Current Positions Dividends => This will give you the dividends that you have collected for the current holding.
Summary: By starting with the current cost then subtracting all dividends collected (for current and closed positions) and also subtracting your sale of stocks (i.e. closed p&l), you can get your initial capital layout.
However, I personally think that it is not the “right” way to really think about performance because it does not consider time in market.
This sounds right. Thanks a lot for the clarity.
Noted its not a correct reflection of the performance. Was just trying to get the figure more to see how much $$ have I put to work thus far.
Another quick question if you dont mind. Overall P&L ( +Div ) % is a % of the Current Cost ( Capital ) right? There is a 3% difference between the % shown vs when i take the P&L ( +Div) divided by the Capital reflected. if so and this is prob due to Fx?
Also would it be correct to say this Overall P&L ( +Div) in % terms may not be quite relevant or correct if our Capital has changed over time?
Cheers.
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