Stock Options & RSUs

Cadence Money tracks employer-granted equity compensation: stock options, typically ISOs or NSOs, and Restricted Stock Units. Grants live alongside your other assets under Net Worth and roll in at fair market value as they vest.

Equity is often the most volatile and least liquid part of someone’s compensation, so giving it a dedicated home - rather than mixing it in with brokerage holdings - keeps the vesting picture and the valuations clearly separate.

1. Tap the + button - it is on every page - and choose Account or Asset.
2. Set the type to Stock Option/RSU.
3. Enter the current share price - the fair market value (FMV).
4. Decide about Track individual grants next, because this checkbox sits above the share fields and changes which ones you get.
5. Left off - fill in Shares and Average Strike Price side by side, then read the resulting Value underneath. It is worked out for you and cannot be typed into. For RSUs, leave the strike at zero.
6. Switched on - the Shares and Average Strike Price fields are replaced by a Grants list, where each row takes its own Shares Granted, Strike Price, Vesting Start, Cliff, Vesting Period and Frequency.
7. Save.

You can record multiple grants over time and each tracks independently, which mirrors how grants usually work.

Vesting is opt-in. By default a grant uses a flat model where every share counts toward your net worth, with no vesting applied. That is the simplest way to track equity you just want reflected at its current value.

Turn on Track individual grants and Cadence Money models the vesting start, cliff, period and frequency you set. As time passes, shares move from unvested to vested, and only vested shares roll into your net worth. Unvested shares are tracked but not counted, since you do not own them yet.

That keeps your net worth honest: what you have today, rather than what you would have if you stayed for the full schedule.

Both types use the current share price you enter as fair market value. From there they are valued differently, matching how they actually work:

So an option grant and an RSU grant of the same size contribute very different amounts, especially early in a company’s life when FMV is close to strike.

Fair market value is the lever that determines what your equity is worth on any given day, and nothing updates it for you. Refresh it when something changes the price:

1. A new internal 409A valuation at a private company.
2. A fresh round of funding.
3. A meaningful move in the market price for a publicly traded employer.

Private-company valuations typically refresh once or twice a year. For public stock, update as often as is useful - monthly or quarterly beats chasing daily moves.

Every FMV update is captured as a snapshot, so your net worth chart reflects each change on the date you make it rather than freezing at the original grant value.

Combined with vesting progress, that gives two layers of movement over time: more shares vesting, and the per-share value moving. Both show up in history without any extra bookkeeping.

Your grants also appear under Equity Compensation on the Income tab, alongside your other earnings. See Tracking Income.