IPO P&L Tracker
Once shares are allotted, the question that actually matters is simple: are you up or down, and by how much? The mechanics behind that number are less simple than they look, especially once you're holding shares from several IPOs at different stages.
Realized vs Unrealized Profit
Realized profit is profit you've actually banked — from shares you've sold. It's calculated as the net sale proceeds (sale price × quantity, minus brokerage, STT, exchange charges, and other costs) minus what those shares originally cost you at your allotment price. It's real cash, not an estimate.
Unrealized profit is paper gain or loss on shares you're still holding — current market price compared to your average cost. It moves with the market and isn't locked in until you actually sell. A dashboard that only shows one of these numbers, or blends them without labeling which is which, makes it easy to overestimate how much you've actually made.
A Common Mistake: Double-Counting a Sale
When you sell shares, the full sale proceeds land back in your account — but that includes both your original principal and the profit. If a tracker adds the full sale amount to your wealth on top of already reducing your holding's cost basis, it counts the principal twice. Only the profit or loss on top of what you originally put in should move your P&L — the principal returning is just your money coming back, not new wealth.
How ROI Should Be Measured
Return on investment only means something relative to the right base. Measuring ROI against the amount you applied for, or the amount that got allotted, tells you how one batch of applications performed — useful, but not the full picture. Measuring it against your original capital — everything you actually put in across every fund source — tells you how your money performed overall, which is the number that actually matters when deciding whether IPO investing is working for you.
Tracking It Across Multiple Accounts
Realized and unrealized profit both need to roll up across every demat account you apply from and every IPO you've been allotted, not just the most recent one — otherwise you're only ever seeing part of the picture.