Virtual Posting

A virtual posting is a posting enclosed in parentheses () or square brackets [] that doesn’t need to balance with the other postings in the transaction. Virtual postings exist for budgeting and tracking purposes — they let users associate amounts with accounts without affecting the real double-entry balance.

Parenthesized postings () are fully virtual — they don’t balance and don’t affect any real account. Bracketed postings [] are “balanced virtual” — they must balance with other bracketed postings in the same transaction but are separate from the real postings.

This is a Ledger-specific feature that doesn’t exist in Beancount, which rejects any transaction that doesn’t fully balance.