The program can keep track of your trades. The trades are entered either manually, or during the automatic brokerage service.
There are many reasons for this. One is so that we have complete records of all of our transactions: Deposits to the brokerage house, trades, fees, interest, etc., so that we can have records that can be used to verify brokerage statements. As is well known, banks make mistakes, and we must protect our mistakes.
A second reason for this is the opportunity to run queries over the database, which give profits each month, for each stock, or whatever.
Finally, this gives us the important opportunity to calculate the maximum drawdown of our account. When trading, there are two important items. One is our profits and losses (P&L). The other is maximum drawdown, the maximum difference from a high value in our account to a low value. Once this is too large, we sell, regardless of other trading considerations. Very few stock accounting packages give this vital information.
I wrote an accounting package in 1986, in which I keep track of all my expenses. Been using it since, continuously updating it. Reconciling bank statement, prepare reports, etc. However, I found it too hard to add brokerage statements to the program. These statements are so very complicated. Well, I finally succeeded in adding it to patterns. Debugging was difficult, as I made all types of mistakes. I have a Roth and an IRA account, and when I would trade, I made mistakes putting the trade as a Roth rather than an IRA. I was able to fix all the mistakes, and get the program to agree with the statements.
To enter the accounting module, from the Contracts table, press the menu Contracts | Trades.
