Investing ~ Portfolio management software programs

Several hundred portfolio management programs are available for your investment tracking. The programs vary in price from free to $800. Many of the freeware and shareware portfolio management programs include an amazing amount of features, but are somewhat cumbersome to use. Some brokers give free portfolio management programs to customers who open an account. Financial data providers frequently give free portfolio man agement programs with a subscription to their services. Other portfolio management programs are components of larger investment analysis applications. To discover what works for you, try some of the free demonstrations or trials that vendors offer. They require no obligations, and after sampling several programs, you can get a good idea of which features you need. Here are some examples of PC-based portfolio management programs:

Portfolio Systems Inc. comes in three flavors:

• Portfolio Gains ($145) is geared for individual investors and allows data export to TurboTax, provides unlimited quotes and portfolio updates, has complete privacy, allows an unlimited number of accounts, tracks stock and options trades, and provides an account summary view.

• Option Money ($345) is designed for active stock and option traders. Investors can track their option strategies, check out account statistics, and view their option and stock positions. Additionally, Option Money supports an interface between investors and their brokerages.

• Portfolio Director ($795) includes all the previous features and con solidates reports, easily manages multiple accounts, and offers an aggregate portfolio view. A free 30-day trial period is available. To use real-time quotes with Option Money or Portfolio Director, you have to subscribe to either the Chicago Board Options Exchange (www.cboe.com) for $19.95 per month for unlimited quotes plus exchange fees, or PCQuote.com (www.pcquote.com) for $19.95 per month for unlimited real-time equity and option quotes plus exchange fees.

Captool Individual Investor for Windows includes a portfolio management tool for all types of securities and transactions. One of the benefits of this portfolio pro gram is that it accounts for reinvestments, short sales, splits, mergers, and return on capital. The program contains over 70 transaction codes to facilitate modeling all situations and calculates returns on invest ments (ROIs), estimates your tax liabilities, and performs batch valua tions (for multiple portfolios). Captool Individual Investor automatically updates security prices with your Internet access. You can also make manual entries as well as customized reports and graphical reports to include valuation versus time, ROI versus time, and portfolio growth versus indices. The program runs under Windows 95/98/NT/2000/Me/XP, and it costs $249 plus shipping and handling.

Fund Manager is a top-rated portfolio management program for stocks and mutual funds for the average individual investor. You might experience a learning curve, but samples will help you get the hang of it. Fund Manager pro vides many easy-to-read graphs, charts, and reports that you can print. Update prices by clicking Internet. Retrieve the latest quotes from AOL, CompuServe, or many international Internet sites. Fund Manager imports from Prodigy, MSN, Quicken, and other sources, tracking your investment performance quickly and easily. The program runs under Windows 95/98/NT/2000/Me/XP. There are three versions of the pro gram. You can try all three for free. The Personal version is $59, the Professional version is $195, and the Advisor version is $395.

NAIC Personal Record Keeper is the official software offered by the National Association of Investors Corporation (www.better-investing.org) for personal portfolio management. The program tracks investment transactions (buy, sell, income, and reinvestment) for a variety of investments. It also automati cally updates prices from online services. You can print reports that record the full history of your portfolio or for a specified time period, including industry and company size breakdowns and return calcula tions. The program generates more than 35 reports and graphs, keeps tax records, indicates diversification, compares portfolio performance to the market, and automatically notifies you if a price alert has been reached. The program runs on PCs with Windows 95/98/2000/Me/XP. A free 30-day demo is available for download. The program costs $89.

Personal StockMonitor is an investment tool that uses the Internet to assist you in making better financial decisions by providing continuously updated quotes and charts on your desktop computer for free. Personal Stock Monitor collects quotes from 15 markets worldwide and includes a port folio manager that works in the background, recalculating the value of your holdings. You get links to news, research, and charts. You also get configurable intraday, end of day, and asset allocation charts, as well as import and export capabilities from Quicken, MS Money, MetaStock (www.equis.com), and similar software programs, giving you a consoli dated view of your accounts. In other words, Personal StockMonitor retrieves raw data from the Internet and organizes it according to your preferences. Your portfolio information is stored on your hard drive instead of the Internet. Overall, Personal StockMonitor combines online finance Web sites with the convenience, automation, and privacy of a desktop application. The program runs on PC Windows 95/98/2000/Me/XP. Personal StockMonitor Gold is $49.95, and Personal StockMonitor is $29.95. A free 30-day trial is available.