Share holdings reconciliation guide

Your broker says you own 200 shares. Summ says 100. Or your dividends come out lower than the payments that actually hit your account, and you can't work out why.

When your numbers don't line up, it's almost always the same root cause: Summ doesn't have your full purchase history for that holding. Here's why that happens, how to spot it, and how to fix it.

Why your holdings matter so much

Summ works out your dividends, dividend reinvestments and corporate actions from how many shares you hold on each date. If the share count is wrong, everything built on it is wrong too, and it stays wrong: correcting one dividend by hand won't fix the next one, because that's worked out from the same holding.

So when something looks off, start with your holdings before anything else.

Look for the missing purchase history banner

After you import, if any of your holdings don't have the purchases to back them up, you'll see a banner telling you some purchase history is missing. Your Accounts page lists the shares affected.

If you see that banner, click it and Ask Summ will guide you through resolving it in the chat. Until it's sorted, dividends and corporate actions for those holdings won't be right.

The most common reasons

You bought the shares on a different broker

This is the big one. Say you bought 100 shares on Selfwealth, moved them to Stake, then bought 100 more on Stake. Your Stake export shows the 100 you bought there, but it doesn't record the 100 that were transferred in. Import only Stake and Summ sees half your holding.

The fix is to import your history from every broker you've held those shares with, not just the one you use now.

Your import doesn't cover everything

Check that you've imported every account, and that the date range on each export covers your whole history. If it starts too late, your earliest purchases get left out.

They were free or reward shares

Shares you got as a sign-up offer or a reward usually don't show up as a purchase in your export, so Summ has nothing to match them to.

Your dividend reinvestment isn't set up

Shares from a dividend reinvestment plan come from the share registry, not your broker, so they're missing from your broker export. Setting up your plan in Summ adds them. Our DRP and DSSP guide shows you how.

If your foreign dividends don't match

Dividends from foreign shares usually have foreign tax taken out before they reach you, somewhere between 15% and 30%. Summ uses 15% by default, which is the rate you get if you've submitted a W-8BEN form. If you haven't, your broker may have withheld 30%, so its figures won't match Summ's.

To change the rate, go to the asset details page for that share, open the settings dropdown and update the withholding tax. It's the same place you set up dividend reinvestment.

Let Ask Summ investigate it with you

You don't have to work through this on your own. Click the missing purchase history banner and Ask Summ opens a guided chat that goes through the likely causes for that holding and helps you resolve it. For anything else that doesn't match, open Ask Summ and describe it.

If a dividend or reinvestment still looks wrong

Work through it in this order:

1. Is the holding right? Clear any missing purchase history first.
2. Is your dividend reinvestment set up, with the right dates?
3. Is the data wrong? Things like the issue price and franking come from the company itself, so this is rarely the cause.

The one figure you might genuinely need to change on a dividend is the tax withheld, because that depends on your own situation.

Add your stocks to Summ

Frequently asked questions

Why is my dividend lower in Summ than at my broker? Usually because Summ has fewer shares for that holding than you really own, often from a transfer or a dividend reinvestment plan that isn't in your export.

I transferred shares between brokers. What do I import? Your history from every broker that held them, so Summ can see the original purchases.

Why don't my foreign dividends match my broker? Check the withholding tax. Summ uses 15% by default, the rate that applies if you've submitted a W-8BEN, while your broker may have withheld up to 30%. You can change it in the settings dropdown on the asset details page.

Should I edit my dividends to match? Generally no. Fix the holding instead, and the dividends will follow.

Does this affect my tax report? Yes. Missing purchase history means a missing cost base, which can overstate the gain when you sell.

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This article is general information about how Summ records share holdings. It is not tax, financial or legal advice, does not take your circumstances into account, and should not be relied on to work out your own tax position. Speak to a registered tax agent about your own holdings.