Contents
This article shows you how to link your brokerage account(s) to Stock Rover so you can automatically monitor, analyze and research your portfolio(s) from within Stock Rover.
Stock Rover’s brokerage integration provides a complete view of all your portfolios, as it handles multiple portfolios within a brokerage, as well as portfolios maintained in multiple brokerage houses.
Before jumping in, let’s define what a “Linked Portfolio” is.
A Linked Portfolio is a portfolio maintained in Stock Rover that is “Linked” to your brokerage portfolio. When you link your Stock Rover account to your brokerage(s), a read-only connection is established between your brokerage and Stock Rover. Once the connection is established, details for each portfolio are then retrieved by Stock Rover and updated nightly. This means that your portfolio(s) holdings in Stock Rover are always in sync with your portfolio(s) holdings in your brokerage account(s).
A Linked Portfolio is the easiest and most efficient way to keep your portfolio up to date in Stock Rover and ensure that Stock Rover’s Portfolio Analytics is evaluating all portfolio activity.
If you prefer not to connect to your brokerage, Stock Rover also supports Manual Portfolios, where you manually update the holdings in a Stock Rover portfolio to match those of a portfolio in your brokerage. Manual Portfolios are also handy when you want to create your own model portfolio(s).
You create a Linked Portfolio using the the Brokerage Connect tool in Stock Rover. Brokerage Connect uses Yodlee, a trusted cloud-based account aggregator to establish a read-only connection to your brokerage(s).
A quick word about safety and security. Yodlee handles billions of transactions for millions of users. Their security policies are supervised by banking agencies and they comply with the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (GLBA) preventing the disclosure of personally identifiable information. Only Yodlee interacts with your account credentials and institutions. Stock Rover never handles and does not have access to your brokerage credentials.
Brokerage Connect is available to all Stock Rover subscribers, though the number of brokerage connections and portfolios supported differ based on your plan. Even free users can access Brokerage Connect, with the same limits as Essentials users.
Yodlee’s brokerage integration provides end-of-day positional data. This means that when an investor connects Stock Rover to their brokerage(s), daily portfolio positions are returned by Yodlee and synchronized with corresponding Linked Portfolios inside of Stock Rover.
Because Stock Rover’s portfolio tracking is position based, we do not capture the gains or losses from day trading (holding a position for less than a day), or from selling at a better price than the closing price. However the results will show up indirectly via a change in your cash position and account value. Note that the analytics still tend to be very accurate, as missed gains or losses tend to average out.
Portfolio Manager gives us access to all things related to portfolios.
Portfolio Manager functions include the ability to view and modify a portfolio’s positions or, if we prefer, view and modify the underlying buy and sell transactions.
As we’ll see in a bit, there may be instances where we will need to access Portfolio Manager to affect changes to a Linked Portfolio.
The example below is showing a portfolio of four positions.
Although Stock Rover is position based, we do support transactions. Stock Rover’s transactions provide an audit trail, tracking why a position changed. Stock Rover infers “buy” and “sell” transactions based on the change in positions.
The transactions listed below were inferred based on the change in end-of-day positional data provided by Yodlee.
When a Linked Portfolio is initially created, the most current portfolio positions are returned. Going forward the Linked Portfolio will then be updated when the holdings in the brokerage portfolio change.
Below we’ll delve into how Stock Rover handles portfolio history and how you can add additional portfolio history. We’ll also show how you can make adjustments to a Linked Portfolio on the rare occasion where the data returned by the brokerage is incorrect.
To create a Linked Portfolio we’ll first want to launch Brokerage Connect. There are several ways to access the tool. The first way is by clicking selecting ‘Brokerage Connect’ in the Start Menu.
You can also select ‘Brokerage Connection’ under Portfolio Actions or when your are in the Portfolio Manager, select ‘Brokerage Connect’ under ‘More Actions’. Both options are highlighted below.
When you launch Brokerage Connect you’ll be connected to the Yodlee interface, where you’ll then be able to search for your brokerage house.
Below we searched for and found Fidelity and are now being prompted for our brokerage account login information.
Once the connection has been verified, you will see the Brokerage Connections panel in Stock Rover with your portfolio(s) from the linked account loaded.
Below is an example of a Fidelity Investments brokerage account connection with one portfolio.
By default, the portfolio(s) that appear in the Brokerage Connections panel will be linked to a new Stock Rover portfolio with the legal name of the portfolio as it appears in your brokerage account.
If you’d like, you can rename the Linked Portfolio in Stock Rover to something a bit more friendly.
You’ll first want to click on “Portfolios” in the Start Menu and then select the Linked Portfolio you’d like to rename in the left-hand Portfolios pane. Note that the icon next to the portfolio is slightly altered to indicate it is linked.
You can then either right-click on the portfolio and select rename or select ‘Rename this Portfolio’ under Portfolio Actions.
It is important to understand that when you first link your Stock Rover account to your brokerage account(s), Yodlee returns your portfolios’ current positions. Because only your current positions are known, the buy date for each of the holdings is set to the date the connection is established.
The example below is showing a first-time connection to a Linked Portfolio in the Portfolio Manager. We can see via the Transactions tab that each of the portfolio’s positions was created on the date the brokerage connection was established which is January 23rd.
Going forward portfolio history is tracked and updated on a daily basis. Stock Rover will update your Linked Portfolio(s) to match your brokerage, based on the positional data returned by Yodlee.
If you would like the Portfolio Analytics to account for position changes previous to the date that the brokerage connection was established, you will need to import past position history.
You can import your position history via the Import Updates option, available in the Portfolio Manager.
You will be importing .CSV or .XLSX files that each contain all the positions from a monthly or quarterly brokerage statement. It is important that these import files contain all portfolio positions. For example, if the file being imported only contains detail on 2 out of 5 of your holdings Stock Rover will assume you sold the 3 missing holdings.
You will want to import the files starting with the oldest brokerage statement and then move forward chronologically. Each time you import a file, Stock Rover will adjust your portfolio positions and infer the appropriate buy and sell transactions.
The Import Update option is initiated by selecting the “Import” button in the Positions tab in the Portfolio Manager. Before clicking on “Import” you want to make sure to set the “Positions as of” date to the brokerage statement date. To set the “Positions as of” date click on the calendar icon circled in the screenshot below and select appropriately.
Clicking the Import button will then launch the Import Portfolio window, where you then Browse for the file and then select Import.
Even without importing position history, you can always analyze your portfolio and view the historical performance prior to the date the brokerage connection was established via a Stock Rover feature called Backcasting.
Backcasting projects the holdings of the portfolio on the date of the portfolio’s earliest position record even further back in time, as far back as the earliest report date supported in Stock Rover, which is January of 2007. Backcasting can be enabled or disabled on a per-portfolio basis.
Backcasting is enabled by default, however you can turn backcasting off so that Portfolio Analytics uses the earliest buy date entered in the portfolio as the earliest date it will report on. The “Explain” icon, highlighted in the screenshot below, provides a brief explanation of backcasting.
When Stock Rover updates a Linked Portfolio with new position data from your brokerage, the tickers are verified to make sure that they can be priced. If a position cannot be priced, then the ticker is classified as an “Asset”.
Assets help you distinguish between tickers that are included in Stock Rover’s research and analytics and those that are not.
An Asset will typically be classified as a Fund, a Stock, a Bond, or an Option, but there are also many other classifications. such as real estate or commodities. In the case of a Stock or a Fund that can’t be priced, it may be because the ticker is not listed on a supported exchange or there was a glitch, where Yodlee returned incorrect information, in which case you can easily correct the misidentified ticker symbol.
If your Portfolio contains assets, they will be listed at the end of the list of positions in Portfolio Manager. In the example below the symbol, MAX202745 is a Fidelity 529 College Saving Fund, which isn’t listed on an exchange. We can see that the MAX202745 ticker is listed at end of the alphabetical list of positions just after THO – Thor Industries.
When you load a Portfolio with Assets into the Table, an Asset summary row is displayed at the bottom. The screenshot below shows the portfolio’s positions along with a summary of Assets using the Portfolio Performance View.
When you click “>” on the “> Assets” label, a popup will appear with details for each of the Assets. In our example, we have a single asset.
A Linked Portfolio will almost always match what is reported in your brokerage. With that said, there are rare occasions where you may need to update a position in your Linked Portfolio. A couple of the common cases where an update is required are listed below.
If the Yodlee feed returns the wrong Cost Per Share for a holding, the cost can be easily adjusted in the Portfolio Manager to the correct value.
In the Portfolio Manager, you’ll want to choose the positions tab. You can then select the Cost Per Share cell that corresponds to the holding you would like to adjust and then update the price. The new Cost Per Share will remain until the portfolio gets an update from the brokerage with a change in the quantity.
On rare occasions the Yodlee feed can misidentify a symbol. Examples include assigning an outdated ticker symbol to a position, or the position being misclassified as a Bond instead of a Stock, or the brokerage using a different symbol for a security than Stock Rover does. In any case, a misidentified symbol cannot be priced and will therefore be categorized as an Asset. However, you can correct this so it shows as a priced position, if Stock Rover can price it.
Correcting a misidentified symbol is straightforward. You begin in the Portfolio Manager and choose the appropriate portfolio, and then click on the Positions tab. While in the Corrections column, you will then click on the Edit button that corresponds to the misidentified symbol.
A Brokerage Feed Corrections window will then appear. Here you can enter and then “Save” your Corrected Value(s).
Let’s begin by doing a quick review of how Brokerage Connect works.
When the Brokerage Connect tool connects to your brokerage, it performs a portfolio discovery. For each discovered portfolio, a Linked Portfolio is created in Stock Rover.
Brokerage Connect then updates each Linked Portfolio with the portfolio’s positions returned by the brokerage. The position data returned by the brokerages mirrors what you see on your brokerage statement; where you have a line for each holding with the ticker, quantity, and cost per share.
Note that corresponding buy and sell transactions are inferred by Stock Rover, based on the changes in portfolio positions. This allows you to to easily track position history as well as the transactions necessary to effect the position changes.
Brokerage Connect updates a Linked Portfolio…
The synchronization of your Linked Portfolio with your brokerage is almost always transparent. However, for those rare occasions where a Linked Portfolio is not in sync with its brokerage here are some helpful troubleshooting tips.
When you launch Brokerage Connect there is a status indicator next to the Brokerage name that tells you whether the last connection was successful and the date and time of that connection.
Below is an example of a successful update by Brokerage Connect to a Linked Portfolio called “Fidelity Investments – Joint”
Below is an example of Brokerage Connect failing to connect. An update was initiated by clicking on the gear to the far right of Fidelity Investments and selecting “Refresh”.
There are a number of scenarios that can cause a Brokerage Connect to fail:
If you are experiencing a connection problem, do not delete the brokerage connection, as doing so will delete all the portfolio’s history and you’ll then need to Import Updates from your monthly or quarterly brokerage statements.
Although Brokerage Connect automatically updates your Linked Portfolio, you can manually force an update.
You’ll want to:
The “Edit Credentials” window is unique to each brokerage. In our example, we are showing what the “Edit Credentials” window looks like when we select a Fidelity Investments brokerage account.
– You only need to re-enter your account information if your password has changed. – If you see the message “You are linking to the same account again which is currently in progress“, this means an update is already in progress. You’ll want to click “Done” and wait a few minutes for the current update to complete. You can then click the Gear next to the brokerage and select Edit Credentials. – If the issue is persistent and you cannot successfully force an Update you can request assistance by emailing support@stockrover.com.
Note: When you force an update, the brokerage returns whatever position data it has at that moment. Changes to your portfolio that result in new positions, changes in quantities of existing positions and/or removal of positions will all show in Stock Rover once they have settled in your brokerage.
We hope you have found this post on Brokerage Connect useful. Brokerage connect is a safe, secure way to automate your portfolio tracking across multiple portfolios and brokerages.
Once the brokerage connections are made, everything is automatic. Your portfolios within Stock Rover are kept up to date and accurate with zero work on your part.
Brokerage connect is a real time saver. It allows you to focus on how your portfolios are performing, rather than the mechanical work of keeping them accurate and up to date by hand.
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