Stator Portfolio Management Software - any good?

[quinn123]

Stator-AFM

Hi,

has anyone had success in importing there closed trades from commsec to Stator-AFM? I find entering the trades manually too time consuming. The format commsec exports trades in doesn't suit Stator I have found. Is interactive brokers better?

The issue I have is that it takes some time to plug you trades in. If you are making alot of intra-day trades its a little time wasting to be sitting there plugging all your buy/sell orders in.

I'm now thinking of only using stator for my medium-long term investments because these are the only investments I would be thinking about holding for more than a year and which will have capital tax reductions.

For my day trading I'm thinking of just having a seperate bank account. Then working out your capital gains tax is easy. It would just be your ending capital for financial year minus your starting capital in the financial year minus any credited capital plus any debited capital from the account.

What do you other day traders use for calculating your capital gains for tax time.

If you were making 50 trades in one day you would understand where I'm coming from becasue plugging 50 trades into stator at one time would be a challange in itself.

Cheers,

Quinn

 

[So_Cynical]

Re: Stator-AFM

Hi,

has anyone had success in importing there closed trades from commsec to Stator-AFM? I find entering the trades manually too time consuming.

It took me 3 weeks to type in 3 and a bit years (110 transactions) worth of buys and sells...i still haven't finished with the dividends. Stator as you suggested is probably not really suited to high frequency day trading.

 

[Paradiso]

Stator is an over-complicated product and I would suggest extreme caution for anyone thinking about buying it. The application seems to have a very limited focus and would not suit everyone.

Some very basic features are missing, such as the ability to partially close a position. It is all or nothing. There are plenty of reasons why someone might want to only partially close a position and for the application to simply refuse to accommodate this is very weird.

 

[Wysiwyg]

Some very basic features are missing, such as the ability to partially close a position. It is all or nothing. There are plenty of reasons why someone might want to only partially close a position and for the application to simply refuse to accommodate this is very weird.

That is a lie. Please get your facts right. Of course you can partially close trades in Stator.

 

[Wysiwyg]

Re: Stator-AFM

If you were making 50 trades in one day you would understand where I'm coming from becasue plugging 50 trades into stator at one time would be a challange in itself.
Quinn

Hi,

You need to format in correct order your trade data (I copied and pasted the relevant data to each column in a spread sheet because the broker layouts are different). You can see below how I have in order (ticked box numbered) the "fields" that I match in the spread sheet. You will have to format your cells in the spread sheet too. Keep a master copy of your spread sheet so all you have to do is populate the columns with copy and paste once per day or week or month.

* You can also arrange your Stator form to match the layout in order of your brokers statement but for my Forex trades, the broker statement does not provide all the data I need so I created my own spread sheet blank to copy and paste multiple trades to.

 

[So_Cynical]

Stator is an over-complicated product and I would suggest extreme caution for anyone thinking about buying it. The application seems to have a very limited focus and would not suit everyone.

Some very basic features are missing, such as the ability to partially close a position. It is all or nothing. There are plenty of reasons why someone might want to only partially close a position and for the application to simply refuse to accommodate this is very weird.

Like all good, powerful software it just takes a little getting used to..in 6 months ill probably still be learning how to drive it....i tested pretty much every product on the market and probably a few many would of never heard of, i couldn't find anything that was perfect and that had all the features i wanted but finally settled on Stator as it just made the most sense.

Must admit it was only after installing the Stator demo first...getting pissed of at it and then testing everything else over a 4 or 5 month period, that i finally came back to Stator with a new respect.

 

[Paradiso]

That is a lie. Please get your facts right. Of course you can partially close trades in Stator.

Here is part of an email sent to me from the Stator support desk

Hello XXXXXX,

So for a partial sale of 300 shares, you would enter the entry details along with the exit details all on one line in your import file. Showing the quantity for the trade as 300.

You need to treat each closed trade as a whole trade, forgetting that they may have been a partial sale of a parcel.

I hope this helps, please let me know if you have any further questions.





So in effect, it is up to the user to manually create partial stock sales. So for example if I bought in 2007, 1000 shares of BHP and I sold 500 of those shares in 2009, I must go back to that 1000 share purchase entry and delete it and in turn create 2 x 500 share purchase and then I can close one of those.

In order to import my entire portfolio and trading history, the amount of work required would be huge and simply not worth the effort.

With such a high barrier to entry, this software is not for everyone.

 

[Wysiwyg]

You need to treat each closed trade as a whole trade, forgetting that they may have been a partial sale of a parcel.[/B]

I hope this helps, please let me know if you have any further questions.

Mate. You don't understand.

So in effect, it is up to the user to manually create partial stock sales. So for example if I bought in 2007, 1000 shares of BHP and I sold 500 of those shares in 2009, I must go back to that 1000 share purchase entry and delete it and in turn create 2 x 500 share purchase and then I can close one of those.

I have done a trade to show you the "basic" process that most if not all portfolio management software has. That is partial closure of a trade.

Note on the picture the dates and the *sale details. Purchase price 1000 BHP at $30 on 1/1/2007 and sale of 500 on 1/1/2011 at $45. Very basic.

 

[Paradiso]

Mate. You don't understand.


I have done a trade to show you the "basic" process that most if not all portfolio management software has. That is partial closure of a trade.

Note on the picture the dates and the *sale details. Purchase price 1000 BHP at $30 on 1/1/2007 and sale of 500 on 1/1/2011 at $45. Very basic.

I am afraid you don't understand.

I am talking about importing my entire trading history using the import function. I have no time or inclination to manually enter all my trades for the past 5 years through the Stator user interface. Which is what you are posting about.


What Stator support is telling me is that I can't import my trading history because the software cannot import partial position close. So my choices are

a) Go through my entire trading history data file and account for every partial close by splitting the opening position in two or more opens.

OR

b) As you have said, I can manually enter my entire trading history through the stator front end.

Both choices are extremely tedious and simply not worth the effort.

 

[Liar's Poker]

Re: Stator-AFM

It took me 3 weeks to type in 3 and a bit years (110 transactions) worth of buys and sells...i still haven't finished with the dividends. Stator as you suggested is probably not really suited to high frequency day trading.

Cynical,

Doesn't Stator automatically fill your dividends once you have entered all your buy and sell orders?



-Liar-

 

[So_Cynical]

Re: Stator-AFM

Cynical,

Doesn't Stator automatically fill your dividends once you have entered all your buy and sell orders?



-Liar-

I just had 5 stocks go ex div in late December and nothing happened automatically.

I think i did stumble across that feature and figured i would get around to setting it up one day...i was hesitant because dividend amounts keep changing and i figured it was just easier and more accurate to do it manually as the divi went ex.

I mite give it a go with HDF now im out of the reinvestment plan...ill put it on my "to do" list

 

[Liar's Poker]

Re: Stator-AFM

I just had 5 stocks go ex div in late December and nothing happened automatically.

I think i did stumble across that feature and figured i would get around to setting it up one day...i was hesitant because dividend amounts keep changing and i figured it was just easier and more accurate to do it manually as the divi went ex.

I mite give it a go with HDF now im out of the reinvestment plan...ill put it on my "to do" list

If you don't mind, could you let me know how go with this once you have a chance to test it out?

I've tested a few software packages that have been shocking when it comes to tracking dividends and stocks with DRP's.

-Liar-

 

[Wysiwyg]

I am afraid you don't understand.

I am talking about importing my entire trading history using the import function. I have no time or inclination to manually enter all my trades for the past 5 years through the Stator user interface. Which is what you are posting about.

Paradiso, Anyone can firstly import all the open trade data into Stator through Tools -> Import Data -> Import Open Trades.
Secondly import all the closed trade data into Stator through Tools -> Import Data -> Import Closed Trades.

So import all open trades and then import all closed trades. This will require copy and paste of data into correct columns on a spreadsheet.

 

[So_Cynical]

Anyone know how to enter a return of capital in stator? its supposed to come off the cost base...or do i just edit the purchase price?..it seems wrong. :dunno:

As usual the help file is of no help at all.

 

[Gringotts Bank]

Traders seem to love this software, but I can't figure out why I'd need it.

Can someone explain how this is better than my brokers end of financial year summary statements?

 

[johnnyhuynh21]

Hi,

Am just learning how to use this program and was wondering if there was a way to have my open positions price automatically move as the price of the share moves. Eg: if i bought BHP at 30, and then it goes to 31, right now it seems i have to do it manually, is there anyway i can open a position with the ticker and have the prices move live with the market ?

thanks!

 

[tech/a]

Hi,

Am just learning how to use this program and was wondering if there was a way to have my open positions price automatically move as the price of the share moves. Eg: if i bought BHP at 30, and then it goes to 31, right now it seems i have to do it manually, is there anyway i can open a position with the ticker and have the prices move live with the market ?

thanks!

If you have live data you can update through Stator automatically
Yahoo will be ok--- it's free.

 

[tech/a]

Traders seem to love this software, but I can't figure out why I'd need it.

Can someone explain how this is better than my brokers end of financial year summary statements?

The software will report in realtime all the numbers a pro trader should know about his trading.

You can instantly evaluate performance.

 

[WilkensOne]

I have just downloaded the trial for stator, it looks great so far! Does anyone know how to enter DRP into the system, I read somewhere that it should automatically do this?

Cheers
Wilkens

 

[So_Cynical]

I have just downloaded the trial for stator, it looks great so far! Does anyone know how to enter DRP into the system, I read somewhere that it should automatically do this?

Cheers
Wilkens

As far as i know its not automatic, but can be entered manually as a DRP....perhaps its different in the new version?