Reference MSN Money Network status for recent issues and scheduled events.
- Tell me more about the retirement of the MSN Money Investment Toolbox
- What are the system requirements for the Portfolio Manager?
- Why don't I see my data? I only see three indexes.
- Why was the MSN Money Investment Toolbox retired?
- What specific tools were retired?
- What functionality was lost in the new Portfolio Manager?
- How do I create a custom view in the new Portfolio Manager?
- What functionality was lost from Charts?
- What functionality was lost from the Stock Screener?
- Will this Portfolio Manager version work on my Mac?
- Is there any other alternative to this new Portfolio Manager?
Tell me more about the retirement of the MSN Money Investment Toolbox.
On November 4, 2009 the MSN Money Investment Toolbox retired. Similar tools will remain available on MSN Money; however, some functionality will be lost.
We understand that MSN Money users may have questions regarding this announcement. See above for answers to some of the more common specific questions.
We would like to thank the many dedicated users who have been enthusiastic supporters of MSN Money’s Investment Toolbox over the years.
Microsoft remains committed to helping customers chart a course to financial well-being. The MSN Money website will continue to provide investing and personal finance tools, commentary and information
What are the requirements to use the Portfolio Manager?
MSN Money's Portfolio Manager requires a system that supports Silverlight technology. This includes all major browsers (Internet Explorer, Firefox, Safari) on both Mac OS X, Linux and Windows
Why don't I see my data? I only see three indexes.
Since your Portfolio data is associate to your Windows Live ID (formerly called Passport ID), the most common reason for not seeing your data is due to inadvertently signing in with a different Windows Live ID. Try signing out and then back in using your original Windows Live ID.
Also reference the following Microsoft Knowledge Base article:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/213873/en-us
If you were able to see your data in the retired Investment Toolbox version of the Portfolio but not in the current Portfolio Manager, it could have been due to some incompatibility or corruption problems with some of your accounts, investments or transactions. At this point, the only options may be to either reenter the missing information or try importing your old My Portfolio mny file into Money 2006, Money 2007 or Money Plus and then use that as a reference point for reentering your data. See the Is there any other alternative answer for more information.
Why was the MSN Money Investment Toolbox retired?
The Investment Toolbox has been a popular tool for many years on Microsoft’s MSN Money website. It was retired for the following reasons:
- Multiple versions of similar tools (ex. Portfolio Manager Investment Toolbox vs. Portfolio Manager Essentials) may cause confusion for our customers and increase support costs.
- The MSN Money Investment Toolbox has limited web browser support (the Investment Toolbox is only compatible with Internet Explorer 6 and higher).
- People want to access their investment data during market hours. Often times this means they are doing so from a work computer in a corporate IT setting. Many IT departments manage employee desktops and prevent the download and installation of an ActiveX control like the Investment Toolbox.
In the future, we plan to focus our development efforts on a single version of our investing tools with widespread browser support.
What specific tools were tired on Nov 4, 2009?
The MSN Money Investment Toolbox includes the following tools:
- Portfolio Manager – Investment Toolbox version
- Stock Charts – Investment Toolbox version
- Stock Screener and Mutual Fund Screener – Investment Toolbox version
The Portfolio Manager Essentials tool was also retired.
What functionality is lost in the new Portfolio Manager?
The functionality which is no longer supported includes:
- Tracking cash transactions. But you can simulate this by using a Money Market Fund. See Microsoft Knowledge base article http://support.microsoft.com/kb/283824 for more information.
- Tracking CD and Bond transactions
- Tracking Options: including Employee Stock Options, and equity options
- Creating multiple custom views. Creating custom column views will be limited to one custom view
- Adding columns for Return calculations for 3-month, 9-, YTD, 2-years and 3-years or the column for showing each position as a percentage of the total portfolio
- Viewing your portfolio on previous dates
- Exporting to Excel
- Copying your portfolio to the Windows Clipboard
- Reordering accounts
- Changing the number of Decimal place for quantity, etc
- Moving positions from one account to another by dragging them
- Showing the Advisor FYI flag
How do I create a custom view in this new Portfolio Manager?
In the View: dropdown select Edit Custom View. You can add and remove columns from your custom view. Choose from over 50 available columns. You can also change the order the columns appear in your custom view by selecting a column name in the Displayed columns: list and clicking the Move Up or Move Down button.
What functionality was lost from Charts?
The following functionality is no longer supported:
- Charting historical investment growth (ex Growth of $10,000 chart)
- Charting historical price performance
- Overlaying personal buy and sell transactions from your personal portfolio
What functionality was lost from the Stock Screener?
The following functionality is no longer supported:
- Saving and sharing your own customized stock screens
- Exporting screener results to your personal portfolio, Excel or other file types
- Fewer data points will also be available for making your own customized screens.
Will this Portfolio Manager version work on my Mac?
The Portfolio Manager preview will work on any system that supports and has Silverlight 2.0 installed. Visit the Silverlight FAQ for answers to many of the common questions about Silverlight.Is there any other alternative to this new Portfolio Manager?
Other sites and services provided by brokers and other financial services may provide alternatives.
Microsoft Money 2006 or newer might be a short term alternative until online services in Money (including quotes updating) become unavailable after Jan 31, 2011. Manual price updating could still be used.
Since Money is no longer being sold as of June 30, 2009, you may need to look for alternative sources such as Amazon of eBay. See the announcement about Microsoft Money for more information.
In most instances Money 2006, Money 2007 or Money Plus can open your Portfolio data file (which is typically saved as My Portfolio.mny) by simply choosing Open under Money's File menu and navigating to the location of your Portfolio data file. If you don't know where it is saved you can search your computer for any 'mny' files.
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For additional information, including how to contact Microsoft Help and Support, visit the Money Support site.
Last Update to this page: November 6, 2009