When you buy ESPP shares or create an ESPP security, Quicken adds a new security to your Quicken Security List that includes the same name as your company's security name, but with the suffix "-ESPP" appended to it. This special ESPP security will appear in your investment transaction list, Portfolio, and Security Detail View for any ESPP transactions. If you also have holdings of your employer's company stock that were not purchased through an ESPP plan, those transactions and the security's price history will remain unchanged. Quicken does this so that it can track transactions at your discounted ESPP purchase price separately from those of the parent security, without artificially reducing price history by recording your discount in the security's price history.
- Open the account you want to use.
- Click Enter Transactions.
- In the Enter Transaction list, select Bought ESPP Shares.
- Select the security that you're purchasing or adding more shares to.
- Click Launch Wizard.
- Follow the on-screen instructions.
- If you need additional information as you're completing the Bought/Added ESPP shares dialogs.
- Do you want to use money from a Quicken account to acquire these shares?
Choose how you want to record cash used to make the
Buy transaction.
- Select Yes, subtract from my cash balance in this account if you're buying the shares with money from the current investment account; this decreases the cash balance of this account. Quicken enters this transaction in the transaction list as a Buy.
- Select Yes, subtract from another Quicken account if you're buying the shares with money from another account; this decreases the cash balance of that account. Quicken enters this transaction in the transaction list as a BuyX.
- Select No, deposit the shares without affecting any cash balance if you're simply depositing the shares in the current investment account; this does not affect the cash balance of any account. Quicken enters this transaction in the transaction list as a ShrsIn (shares in).
- Buy/add shares
In the top half of this page, enter the number of shares you purchased, your actual (discounted) purchase price, the purchase date, and any commissions or other fees.
In the bottom half of this page, enter the:
- Offering date: Enter the first day of the purchase period (your employer may call this the Grant date).
- Ending date: Enter the last day of the purchase period (your employer may call this the Purchase date).
- Price on Offering date: Enter the fair market value of the security on the first day of the purchase period.
- Price on Ending date: Enter the fair market value of the security on the last day of the purchase period.
- Discount rate: Enter the percent by which your purchase is discounted.
- If this is your spouse's ESPP plan, click to select the Spouse's ESPP check box. This helps Quicken assign the correct tax dialog line item to the proceeds when you sell.
Quicken takes the lower price from the two dates (
Offering and
Ending) and reduces it by your discount rate. This calculation should yield a figure that matches the purchase price you entered on the top of this page. If it does not, Quicken will warn you, and you should check your figures.
- Summary
This screen summarizes all the information you've entered in the previous three screens. Make sure that the total transaction cost including commissions or fees matches your records. Feel free to change any information as necessary, and then click Done. Quicken then enters this transaction in your investment account transaction list.
Notes
Recording a transaction in Quicken does not execute a real-world trade, transfer, or other transaction. Contact your broker to execute trades or transfers, and then manually record the transactions in Quicken—better yet, download them directly from your participating financial institution.
