To augment the discussion, the account is a "regular IRA"
funded with after-tax contributions (i.e., no tax
deductions for contributions were received). My
objective is to adjust the cost basis to match that which
is reported on IRS Form 8606 ("Nondeductible IRAs",
http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/f8606.pdf). When
withdrawals are made in the future, it is important to
know the cost basis (i.e., the sum of the pre-tax
contributions) so that only the tax-deferred incremental
growth of the account is taxed.

For the account each individual transaction is (and will
be) entered individually in the register. However, the
initial "Buy" transaction that established the account
value is really a transfer of assets from a former IRA
(not logged within Money 2004). The value of that
initial transaction is the sum of (A) pre-tax
contributions plus (B) the growth that accrued prior to
their sale. The initial cost basis of the account should
be equal to "A" rather than "A+B". My problem is that I
can't see a way to tell Money that basis of the IRA is
the former and not the later.

Your suggestions will be appreciated.

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3Amicrosoft.public.money&btnG=Search
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In microsoft.public.money, Tom wrote:

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The question you will want to address first is how do you want to
handle the account in the future. Will you enter future transactions
individually? Then make one Buy for each current holding with
whatever cost you think should be used.

Are you able to download transactions from the custodian? If so, I
would download what I can. Then I would adjust from there.

If you don't have detailed info or don't want to deal with actual
transaction data in the future, this search will give you some good
reading:
http://groups.google.com/groups?num=...ey&btnG=Search

What basis means to you can differ. You could want basis data for
purposes of performance evaluation. You could want to track
after-tax contributions if you have them. Or there could be other
reasons. If you have a conventional IRA with no after-tax
contributions, basis normally won't matter tax-wise.

I established a new Money (2004) account to track an
IRA. How do I set the cost basis of the account (without
entering all of the transactions from prior years)?

Thanks for your assistance.