4 Reasons income on a PortfolioCenter performance report may not match the Income Report

Q.I ran a the Portfolio Performance Review for the last calendar year and the Income Report for the same year on the same portfolio.  The total income on the performance report does not match the total income on the Income Report.  What’s wrong with my data?

A.The good news is most likely nothing is wrong with your data.  Typically, the Income total on PortfolioCenter performance reports will match the total income on the Income Report for the same time period.  However, depending on your settings and choices, the numbers may differ.

Here are the 4 main reasons why the total income on one report many not match another.

1.  PortfolioCenter starts calculating performance as of the end of business on the first day of the reporting period.   The Income report counts all transactions on the day they occur.

If you run the PortfolioCenter Performance Review and the Income report for the previous year (say 12/31/2012  to 12/31/2103), income paid on 12/31/2012 would in the 2012 performance and would not be included on a 2013 performance report.   But it would be included on the Income Report.  Adjusting the dates on the Income report to 01/01/2013-12/31/2013 will most likely result in matching numbers.

2. You may be including extra types of income on the Income Report which would be in a different category on the performance report. 

For example, if you include Return of Principal payments on Income Report, these ROPs would not be included on the Income total of the performance report.  Check the settings of the Income report.

3.  You may be excluding accounts in the Income Report that are included for performance. 

If you are running these two reports on a group, your performance report includes all accounts in the group regardless of their tax status, while your Income report may show income only in the taxable accounts.  Again, check the settings on the Income report.

4. Finally,  income from any positions excluded from performance will not show on the performance report, but would be included on an Income Report.

For example, suppose your client holds 100 legacy shares of IBM that you track in the portfolio but exclude from performance and billing.  In PortfolioCenter performance reports treat excluded securities as if they do not exist, so any income IBM generates will be omitted from totals and performance.  As a Transaction Report, the Income Report includes all securities in the group and income from IBM would be included.

Bottom line: If you are posting accurate data on the way in, typically these discrepancies result from defaults, report settings and choices, not bad data.

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Photo What a Team by Tony Alter and used here under Flickr Creative Commons.