Exchange Rate Now!

With South Africa hosting the 2010 World Cup, it is no doubt in the travel plan of most tourist in football obsessed United Kingdom (which includes England, Scotland and Ireland). In fact, South Africa is already experiencing a boom in tourists from the United Kingdom now, one year before the World Cup even starts!

Besides the World Cup, there is another factor which may account for the rise in tourist numbers – The favourable exchange rate. The South African Rand is now trading at about 12 Rand to 1 Sterling Pound. This exchange rate is currently more favourable towards the Sterling Pounds compared to other major currencies like the Euro and US Dollar.

Some worries that the South African Rand will move to a downtrend against major global currencies (which include the Sterling Pound) once the World Cup concludes in 2010 (more…)

Besides United Kingdom, Switzerland is another country that has yet to jump onto the Euro bandwagon. Swiss Franc (CHF) is the currency used  Switzerland and there has been no signals from the Swiss government that they will adopt the Euro anytime soon.

Due to the unique status of Switzerland as a banking haven as well as a self-designated “neutral” country during war times, Swiss Banks are the magnet for storage of investments from wealthy individuals (and sometimes crimimals) all over the world. These people park their investments as gold (stored in gold vaults), in foreign currencies (in Swiss Banks) or simply leave it to investment firms to manage their finances in whatever manner is deemed fit.

Swiss Franc, as a result of Switzerland’s financial stability and reputation, remains one of the most traded currency in the world, ranked 5th, just behind the US Dollar (USD), Euro (EUR), Japanese Yen (JPY) and the Sterling Pound (GBP).

Currently, 1 Swiss franc trades at 0.658 Euros, which has stabilised since the spike in Mar 2009 (between 0.65 and 0.68 within 1 week!) (more…)

While Australia is a commonwealth country, it does not share the same currency as United Kingdom. Currently, 1 British Pound/ Sterling Pound (GBP) trades at 2.065 Australian Dollar.

Note: Until 1967, the Australian dollar was pegged to the Sterling Pound. This peg was removed in 1967 when the Sterling Pound greatly depreciated against the US Dollar.

One of the low points of the British Pound came in May 2009, when it was trading at less than 2 Australian dollar. In part, this is caused by the ripple effect of global financial/ economic crisis in the last quarter of 2008. Banks in UK face collapse, which raise the doubt if the Bank of England has the ability to bailout these banks and at the same time flex the muscle to stable the Sterling Pound.

The British Pound has recovered slightly since, although it is now nowhere near the high of 1 Sterling Pound = 2.45 Australian dollar in Oct 2008. This means tourist from Australia can be smiling all the way to UK. Flights from Australia to United Kingdom is now about 30% cheaper due to favourable currency exchange rate as well as lower fuel tax on passengers.

Outside of these 2 countries however, both the Australian Dollar and the Sterling Pound (more…)