Captools/net is the third generation of investment portfolio management, ROI performance measurement and reporting software from Captools Company for investment advisors, money managers, broker/dealers, and others entrusted with managing investment assets. Employing a client/server architecture and utilizing MS-Windows web-server and SQL database technologies, Captools/net delivers a powerful, scalable, and cost-effective investment tracking and client-reporting system. Because Captools/net operates and stores its data on your hardware, it ensures that you maintain control of your valuable client and investment data.

Scalable - Captools/net uses advanced software architecture to compartmentalize various program tasks and functions in a way that allows it to be as easily installed and run on a single desktop or laptop computer as well as to be installed and run on a centralized server.  Multi-user versions can be accessed by users located in the same office as your server, or by users who remotely access your server via the internet.  Whether run locally or remotely, Captools/net provides the desktop application functionality that is desired by users who have a need for extensive data input or manipulation, while still allowing many functions, such as reporting to operate through a web-browser interface.

Client/Account Detail - Captools/net allows you to maintain comprehensive and detailed records concerning your clients, their accounts and their investment requirements.  Client contact detail, note keeping, and PDF form-filling functionality in many cases remove the need to maintain separate contact management and/or form management software.  Other useful client/account functions, such as built-in retirement account minimum withdrawal computations, minimum cash specifications, fee exclusions, margin and short limits and client family/relations records help you to better service your clients and also lay the groundwork for additional future business.

Portfolio Detail - Captools/net expands upon our reputation for maintaining comprehensive, detailed, and audit-compliant account portfolio records. Over 70 transaction codes, plus detailed transaction records, support virtually all security and transaction types, including comprehensive treatment of fixed income securities as well as common stock, mutual funds, annuities, options, etc., .. virtually any investment that can be quantified and valued.  Portfolio transaction, holdings and valuation records are readily accessible in easy-to-review and easy-to-edit data formats. Security preferences such as price alerts, tax factors, fee factors, fee exclusions, tax withholding and no-trade specification may be set at the account level.  Filtering, sorting and subtotaling functions on nearly every data field make it easy to isolate and examine data for a particular security, transaction date or transaction type, while color cues assist you in determining the source and status of data.

Tax Focus - From our first product 20 years ago, our software has provided users with tools to help manage the impact of taxes upon their investments.  This continues with Captools/net.  Account-assignable tax rate classes, designed to accommodate past and future tax rate changes, enable Captools/net to compute estimated taxes on actual and prospective transactions, as well as before and after-tax ROI performance.  Five tax-lot methods (Specific, FIFO, LIFO, Average (single & double category)) and automated tax-lot matching help you to choose and implement the tax lot method which will minimize taxes on your taxable transactions, taking into account holding periods, local, state and federal taxes and same security wash sale tax rules.  Tax oriented income reports segregate income by relevant categories, including taxable and non-taxable, qualified and non-qualified, and realized gains by relevant holding periods, with reports optionally available in 1099 and other tax form relevant formats at higher program levels.  Lastly, Captools/net provides you with a export function which allows you to generate TXF format files which can be imported into the Turbo-Tax tax preparation program.

Customizable Reporting - Captools/net continues our tradition of giving users the power to generate reports superior to typical custodian or outsourced reports.  Such reports reinforce to your clients the value that you are adding in managing their money.  Over 350 data fields and over 40 charts types permit you to construct an almost limitless variety of reports starting from over 50 standard reports.  Practically all other aspects of reports are customizable, from field selection, order and width, to sub-totaling, report orientation, fonts, page headers and footers, labels, etc.  Merged reports permit you to consolidate data from multiple related accounts (e.g., by family, tax id, account group, etc., subject to program level) into a single report, facilitating analysis of overall asset performance and allocation. Cross-reference reports provide you with management level information across all your accounts or across a selected group of accounts. Reports can be generated to PDF, HTML, or exportable plain text format.  PDF format reports can be faxed, or e-mailed as encrypted PDF files, with report copies archived to meet data retention requirements.  Support for real-time web hosting of HTML reports is optionally available at higher program levels, as is output of reports in additional formats.

Investment Performance - Captools/net offers a wide range of return on investment (ROI) performance reporting ranging from reports showing performance at the security level within a single portfolio, to multi-period performance reports across multiple portfolios. ROI's can be computed for individual securities, groups of securities, portfolios or groups of portfolios, before and after taxes and before and after commissions and fees, and optionally on a pre-margin basis. ROI's may be computed as dollar (internal rate of return) and/or time-weighted figures, and presented on annualized and/or non-annualized bases over user specified time periods. ROI computations also generate alpha, beta, standard deviation, sharpe, treynor and correlation statistics versus up to eight user-specified benchmarks.  Benchmarks can consist of market indices and/or can be synthetically constructed from securities or indices.  *AIMR PPS/GIPS reporting compliance, including year 2010 requirements, is supported at higher program levels for users subject to CFA Institute requirements.

Data Interfaces - Professional and higher versions of Captools/net support a large number of broker/dealer, clearing firm, and other institutional data import interfaces, simplifying the acquisition and maintenance of client data. This gives you the flexibility to diversify your clients across custodians, clearing firms, and/or mutual funds without becoming locked into any one of them as a result of your software choice. Captools/net also supports several sources of security pricing corporate action and fundamental data, including subscription and non-subscription (subject to user eligibility) sources.  Third party data can also often be imported through Captools/net's user customizable import utilities.  Users needing to export data can easily do so either directly from the data base, by using a user customizable Captools/net export utility, or through its reporting system to a variety of different data formats.

Data Conversion - Users wishing to convert to Captools/net from other systems are provided with a number of alternatives.  Users of Quicken and MS-Money can export transaction to QIF format, for which Captools/net provides an import utility.  Utilities are also included to support conversion from several other competing portfolio management systems to assist new users in converting their historical data.  In cases where such a conversion is not possible, users often can initialize from data provided by their custodian or clearing firm.   Users needing access to Captools/net data for other application can rest assured that Captools/net Open Data Base Compliant (ODBC) data format provides industry standard access to the data for application programmers.

Time Saving Tools - Captools/net offers numerous time-saving functions assist you in managing investment accounts. These include (some at higher program levels) data reconciliations, portfolio rebalancing, swap trade generation, block trade allocations, flexible client fee billing, including optional incentive billing, and special transaction generation associated with spin-offs and mergers, data rollbacks, etc.  Multi-account processing allows efficient handling of most of these functions.  Furthermore, many functions, including data downloads, custodian data imports, valuations and reports can be scheduled to occur at a specified time as background events using Captools/net’s "Tasker" service. This allows you or your data administrator to simply monitor events rather than having to trigger them manually.

High End Functionality - Captools/net’s functionality goes beyond simply fulfilling the requirements for a typical portfolio manager with the latest technology. In addition to all of the aforementioned capabilities, optional features are available to meet the needs of users with specialized requirements. International date and currency formats and customizable field labels support use by non-U.S. users, as does Captools/net optionally available multi-currency capability.  Optional pooled funds accounting tracks the holdings of fund participants for hedge funds, trust funds, small to mid-sized mutual funds and other pooled investment situations.  Multi-tiered rep based account assignment, rep commission and fee allocation and optional specialized utilities, reports, and web-access features support use by small to mid-sized broker/dealers and mutual funds for both back and front office use.

Captools/net Professional provides portfolio tracking and reporting suitable for single-site investment management offices supporting up to five users, typical of many financial planning, investment advisor, and family office settings. The Pro utilizes the MS-SQL desktop data engine (MSDE) that installs with the Pro. Accordingly it supports low cost of operation since it typically will not require additional database software or tech staffing.

Captools/net Enterprise delivers client investment tracking and reporting suitable for larger numbers of users and accounts typical of larger registered investment advisor and planning firms. It also satisfies the multi-site requirements of independent broker dealers and other investment firms. The Enterprise employs the high capacity MS-SQL server database. This choice permits licensees to add hardware capacity at the server level, thereby scaling Captools/net power to the size of the user’s business.

Control your data, Control your Destiny! - In the competitive world of financial services, access to and control of client data is essential to maintaining control of your clients. Those who depend upon their custodian, clearing firm or some third party service bureau to maintain and report their data jeopardize the clientele and independence that has taken them so long to build. Captools/net gives you the latest in technology without requiring you to forfeit control of your data or be locked in by your custodian or clearing firm. Control your data and control your destiny with Captools/net!

Additional Information:

Captools/net investment software is an information and data management tool designed to meet the investment tracking, analysis, monitoring and reporting needs of advanced investors and various levels of money managers and firms in the financial services industry.  Unlike investment data tracking and reporting solutions offered by clearing firms, custodians and remote "Application Service Providers", Captools/net gives you full control over your data.  This ensures privacy and flexibility in terms of data management and reporting, and if you are a money manager or broker-dealership, strengthens your control of clients and facilitates your independence from clearing firms and custodians.

Captools/net (also sometimes referred to herein as "Captools") maintains a complete record of investment transactions, downloads and imports price quotes for portfolio valuations and security analysis, computes return on investment performance, generates user customizable reports and charts, and performs security analysis.  Account-specific data can often be imported from the broker/dealer, clearing firm, custodian and/or mutual fund company data sources using Captools' institutional data import interfaces (Pro versions/higher).  In other cases such data may be imported through Captools' generic import interface or XML import interface, depending upon data source and format.  Data may also be manually input or edited.

Virtually all security types and transaction types are supported, including stocks, bonds, mutual funds, options, etc., as well as depreciable assets such as real estate and partnership interests.  Investment cost bases may be tracked using four different tax lot methodologies.  Tax lots may be automatically assigned to minimize taxes or maximize gains. Tax reporting and estimated tax computations allow for multiple capital gains holding periods and multiple income categories as is now specified by recent U.S. tax law changes.  Multi-currency portfolio management support is optionally available for most versions. 

Performance is measured using internal rate of return, and may be computed using dollar and time-weighted methodologies.  Performance may be measured before and after taxes, before and after fees and for holdings of individual securities, groups of securities, portfolios and groups of portfolios.  Performance may be compared versus user-selectable benchmark indices on a blended and/or non-blended basis.

Captools/net can generate highly customizable reports, integrating graphics and charts. Reporting output may be printed, output to PDF format, or in some versions optionally generated in HTML format suitable for real time web-hosting.  Report headers and labels may be customized to suit the user's preferred terminology, or to convert them to another language (Roman alphabet) for clients preferring non-English language reports.

A number of different versions of Captools/net are available to best suit the needs of various types of investors and money managers. This documentation may in some instances describe features which are only available at higher level versions of the software.  In these cases, when running the software, you will typically see these features suppressed (not visible) or grayed-out.   If you desire a particular feature not accessible to you, contact Captools Co. Sales to learn at what level that feature would be supported. 

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The various levels of Captools/net are briefly summarized below:

Accountant - Portfolio management licensed for use by those performing an accounting role for a limited number of accounts, typically for extended family, non-profit organization, business internal accounts, or non-money management oversight tracking by an accountant.  Supports merged account reporting and and optionally supports multi-currency portfolios. Client and account records fields and reporting are limited to needs typical for organization internal reporting. The number of accounts are limited.  Users requiring more accounts can upgrade to the Pro or Enterprise versions.  Not licensed to individuals or firms registered with government as offering any kind of investment related services, or to firms offering accounting services to such individuals or firms.

Professional/Level 1 - Portfolio management suitable for many entry level, solo money managers, active private investors, or a small family office with limited accounts and requirements.  Incorporates many widely used custodian data import interfaces, contains entry level client management features and supports client reporting and billing.  The Pro/1 is a single user license and is limited to a single user log-in. 

Professional/Level 2 - Portfolio management suitable for single site, small-office money management firm, family office, or larger fiduciary entity, requiring multi-user access.  Incorporates many widely used custodian data import interfaces, including some more complex interfaces not supported at the Pro/1 level.  Contains additional client management, client reporting and billing features not supported by the Pro/1.   Supports multiple users (up to number of licensed users)  in full multi-user client/server environment, with limited remote access support.

Professional/Levels 3 & 4 - Advanced portfolio management suitable for single site, small-office money management firm, family office, or larger fiduciary entities.  Supports all Captools custodian interfaces supported by Levels 1 & 2, plus some specialty interfaces not supported at those levels.  Advanced features include advanced portfolio rebalancing (e.g. by family and tax id), incentive fee billing support, additional margin and short position monitoring, dividend accrual and optional bond-centric reporting.  Pro 4 additionally supports cash/margin accounting, margin adjusted performance reporting, credit interest generation and various rep. management reporting. Pro 3 and 4 also optionally support Captools/net "fund accounting" for hedge funds, trust accounting and other pooled investment arrangements, subject to a fund accounting surcharge.  Levels 3 & 4 support multiple users (up to number of licensed users)  in full multi-user client/server environment, with remote access support, including optional end client remote access for reports.

Enterprise - This level of Captools/net is designed for larger numbers of end users and higher levels of data volume than would typically be expected by users of the products above.  The Enterprise supports any and all of the features of the products above, depending upon the options selected by the licensee.  Additional features may also be offered at this level which are not available at lower product levels, to support the types of businesses which would typically require the Enterprise product.

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