Free financial diagnosis

If you spend too much time keeping track of your portfolio, it’s time to embrace the Net. Savvy investors have long turned to the Net, in particular, to the many online financial websites, for calculating their returns and even working out tax liabilities. On the Net, online tools make your financial navigation easy and provide you the sophisticated calculation edge that was hitherto available only to fund managers.

It can help you weed out non-performers and re-position your portfolio to capture the existing investment environment. Even if you don’t want to churn your portfolio often, it is necessary that you should stay abreast of every ups and downs in your investments. Says Dhirendra Kumar, CEO, Value Research: “It pays to keep track of your portfolio.

You know the securities that are doing well and those that are dragging your returns.” There are paid and free online sites, and each has its unique features. Some include a complete record of your investments in different asset classes; others offer add-ons such as portfolio analysis, research reports, customised watch-lists, stock alerts, retirement and tax planning, and even capital gains calculators. Of course, you have to key the basic data of your stock holding, their average acquisition price, etc., to help the website track your performance.

After sifting through many online financial websites, we zeroed in on the five most popular free portfolio tracking services—Sharekhan, Value Research, Myiris, India Infoline and Moneycontrol. After creating a dummy portfolio, we monitored their features, worked on the online tools and here’s what we found out.

Myiris

Myiris Tracks only mutual funds and stocks. Performs cash adjustments and updates bonuses and splits. Allows you to open cash-enabled account to keep track of every single transaction. Provides option to switch between different portfolios.

To give a fresh start to your financial planning, Myiris uses trackers that are easy-to-use with a clean layout. Says S. Swaminathan, CEO, Myiris: “Besides all the standard features, investors want net trackers to have user-friendly interface. An easy-touse tracker attracts more users.”

Myiris allows you to open multiple portfolios, tracks mutual funds (MFs), stocks, bonds, commodities, derivatives, bullion, insurance (ULIPs) and fixed deposits. It also updates your portfolio every two minutes, but perhaps, long-term investors can avoid such rapid monitoring.

Another feature is a cash-enabled account that helps you stick to your financial goals irrespective of the market conditions. Says Swaminathan: “One has to enter a fixed amount as opening balance. The tracker then checks whether there’s cash available to fund the transaction. One can add further cash later. With this, one can keep a track of every single transaction affecting the cash balance and also monitor the total cash deposited for investment transactions.”

Unlike other trackers, Myiris alerts you when there's a corporate action such as bonus or rights issue, and also reminds you of SIP payments. The site automatically incorporates the effects of any corporate action in your portfolio.

Sharekhan

Sharekhan Provides alerts based on your research, trade and price of a particular stock or fund. Helps you analyse your portfolio on both realised and unrealised gains/losses. Better for regular market traders than a lay investor.

This website monitors changes in the value of stocks and funds since the purchase date and “calculates” the overall portfolio’s gains or losses. It allows users to create up to five virtual folders and manage an entire family’s portfolio.

The best part is it allows to upload past transactions, too.

Entering a new transaction is a time-taking process. Another drawback is the use of financial jargon such as long position and short position, which can be of help to traders but might not easily be understood by first- time users.

Also, fields such as folio number, while adding the mutual fund information, tend to make the information-keying exercise tedious. Says Amit Shah, Product Manager, Sharekhan: “If you are not a trading user of Sharekhan, the system doesn’t synchronise corporate action (read: bonus, rights, split) to your portfolio. In that case, you have to key in such information.”

Value research

Value research Tracks investments such as stocks, mutual funds, bonds and fixed deposits. Analyses performance of mutual funds over different time periods. Has an excellent user interface but doesn’t perform cash adjustments.

The website has a comprehensive portfolio-analysis page with sector exposures and asset-class balances. It doesn’t automatically update inputs such as corporate action but alerts investors instead.

For example, the buy/sell/split/ bonus /SIP/SWP tools help you buy more shares, sell existing holdings, split shares, etc., and calculate the average purchase price based on the trade information you enter. In addition, users can take advantage of features such as notes for future reference.

Another plus is the “fund performance” feature which gives you not just the returns but also the rank for each MF in your portfolio over different time periods: one week, one month, one year, three years, five years and year-todate. The tracker covers only three asset classes—equity, MFs and fixed income instruments.

The tracker offers two different types of portfolios tracking systems: Quick portfolio and transactional portfolio. Quick portfolio tells you the current value of a collection of funds and stocks. It doesn’t feature any sophisticated analysis but does have the advantage of being quick to set up. The transactional portfolio, on the other hand, looks at each historical transaction that has gone into your portfolio.

India Infoline

India Infoline Keeps tab on your gain/loss and annualised rate of return. Flashes latest news on the stocks and mutual funds in your portfolio. Suited for investors who like simplicity over loads of information.

It is the most simple portfolio tracker in the list. Its no-frills service lacks features such as multiple portfolios, alerts, portfolio analysis, research reports, etc.

The portfolio tracks stocks, MFs, bonds, insurance, fixed deposits, cash and other assets. It also keeps tab on your realised gain/loss and annualised rate of return. In addition, the tracker provides you with recent news about the stocks and funds you are holding.

The tool is simple and there’s plenty of basic information on stocks. Hence, it’s a natural choice for the occasional investor. Another handy aspect is the tracker can download your portfolio as a spreadsheet to your personal computer.

Moneycontrol

Moneycontrol Keeps track of your net worth by assessing your total assets and liabilities. Sends out mail and SMS alerts to users on individual stocks/funds. Ideal for people looking for regular reminders of the value of their investments.

More than just portfolio management, Moneycontrol takes into account your total net worth by deducting your liabilities (loans and borrowings) from assets (property, stocks, MFs, bullion, insurance, cash and other assets).

A graphical representation through pie charts, bar graphs helps to present your financial information better. It also has a handy tool to calculate your short- and long-term capital gains. You can create a watch list for stocks or funds that you have not purchased, but would like to monitor. But the site is cluttered with redundant links and lots of menu options that you may not need. Although, the tracker gives timely alerts on bonus/splits/rights, it does not automatically update the same in your portfolio.

Moneycontrol also lets you access research reports, key financial data and expert views to help you make informed decisions.

The safety check Typically, every net tracker gathers two types of information about users: personal, which individual users provide when registering as a member; and tracking information, which includes your securities in the portfolio. While most trackers claim that they use various advanced security technologies and procedures to help protect your personal information from unauthorised access, security and confidentiality of information cannot be guaranteed 100 per cent. At times, you may be asked to take part in surveys aimed at obtaining general information, for example, your investment experience or your reactions to a particular product. As information obtained in these surveys usually involves a third party, you should opt out of them. But issues of security and confidentiality need not be the overriding reason for not using a portfolio tracker. Millions of people are now using them. Besides, most of the information that an online tracker asks you to submit is available elsewhere too— your demat and bank accounts. So, in a strict sense, there is no real confidentiality of personal and financial information. For instance, your PAN number is available to all kinds of financial-service providers because it’s a mandatory requirement. So, submitting basic information shouldn’t really be a worry.