How to Import Interactive Brokers into Pulse (No Mapping Needed)

Interactive Brokers is one of the formats Pulse parses natively — you export one file and drop it in, no spreadsheet work. The only thing that matters is exporting the right statement.

Step 1 — export the Activity Statement as CSV

1. Log in to IBKR (Client Portal, in a browser).
2. Performance & Reports → Statements.
3. Run an Activity statement for your full date range.
4. Download it as CSV — not PDF, not Flex Query.

The file Pulse reads is the standard Activity Statement whose sections include a Transaction History table. Leave the file exactly as downloaded.

Step 2 — drop it into Pulse

Open Transactions → Import and drop the CSV. Pulse detects the IBKR format from the file itself, reads the account code from the rows, and matches (or offers to create) the right account. The preview shows every row and how it was classified before anything is saved.

What the import does for you

A few IBKR statement quirks are handled so the numbers reconcile to the statement's own totals:

• Buys, sells, dividends import with fees separated out — commission never double-counts against the trade value.
• Withholding tax on dividends is netted into the dividend by date and symbol, so dividends land net, the way the cash actually arrived. The tax on cash interest (which IBKR posts a day later, with no symbol) becomes its own line rather than silently disappearing.
• FX lines — the Forex Trade Component and FX translation adjustments — are summed into one cash adjustment per day, so your imported cash matches the statement's ending balance instead of drifting.
• Re-imports are safe. Every row carries a stable reference, so uploading the same statement twice — or an overlapping period — changes nothing. Export a fresh statement monthly and just drop it in.

Deposits and transfers

External deposits (IBKR calls them Electronic Fund Transfer) import as cash and count toward your invested capital. Internal transfers between your own IBKR accounts (described as Cash Transfer, typically from an account migration) are treated by your account setup: if your Pulse setup includes a bank account (which typically records that funding as its own transfer), the duplicate leg is dropped; otherwise it imports as your funding record.

If something looks off

The two usual suspects: the export wasn't the Activity Statement (a Flex Query or trade-confirmation export has different columns), or the date range missed your earliest activity, so the opening cash appears from nowhere. Re-export with the full range and re-import — duplicates are impossible, so there's no cleanup risk.