When a download custodian doesn't actually download the actual number of bonds purchased, but some multiple of the number of shares, but still quotes the price as a percentage of PAR, then it is necessary to do some additional calculations to get the market value.
Example of Share Factor
Your client purchases 10 bonds at $900 per bond at the price of 99.00. The download sends 10,000 shares and sends the price of 99.00.
It is necessary to calculate a factor that converts the 10,000 downloaded to the actual number of bonds for purposes of calculating the market value and storing the number of bonds.
Advisors Assistant still stores the number of units actually purchased, but Advisors Assistant calculates a share factor so it is able to calculate calculate future buys and sells..
In this case, the share factor is .001 because the vendor downloaded 1,000 times the number of shares, but 10 will be stored in Advisors Assistant.
Share Factor is stored on the Add/Modify Security Screen under the Interest Bearing Tab. It is normally maintained by the download module and can normally be left alone.
Note: If you are placing your clients in investments which have share factors, you should keep them with the same custodian because different custodians may use different factors and that will cause errors in calculating market values. The security has only one symbol or CUSIP and is therefore maintained in one place in Advisors Assistant.
The Share Factor is applied to all buys and sells before storing the number of shares in the transaction. If the share factor is .001 and the custodian sends a sell of 5000 units, the sell transaction in Advisors Assistant will show 5 units sold.
See Also