lloydmav

Hi,

I would like to transfer some money to my oz account (ANZ) which I'm just setting up. Where can I find the best rates? I did some quick checks while in Town, Barclays charge £20 per transfer and a rate of 2.31 whereas the travel agents I went to said no commision but a rate of only 2.2

Whats the best way to transfer small amounts such as £1k at a time and who generally offers the best exchange rates? I've been told that M&S do a really good rate, I didn't even know they did it.....I would like to keep my savings in my ING account because it has a high interest rate and then just transfer money as I need it to my ANZ account

Any thoughts would be appreciated

Thanks

Lloyd

marco121068

I'd use www.tranzfers.com

Charge is £7 a go and pretty good rates.

OzTennis

Do a search on BE's using 'exchange rates', 'currency', 'transfers' and so on - it comes up regularly. Also do a search on tranzfers, HIFX, ozforex, commonwealth bank etc as these would be the recommended businesses to deal with. The travel agent was quoting you the rate they sell A$'s currency to you which will always be well under the rate you can get with the above. I won't go into detail, suffice to say there are tourist rates (for cash, travellers cheques) and market rates (for transfer to a bank account electronically). I did a transfer last week with HIFX and got $2.3540 for example.

OzTennis

lloydmav

thanks for the replys, I'm currently putting a spreadsheet together of historical rates to see if I can pick the best time to transfer :-)

marco121068

Bloody hell - if it was that easy we'd all do it!

OzTennis

Here's some historical rates I've got and I'll go back to 1998!

20/5/98 $2.58
17/6/98 $2.7130
19/8/98 $2.8850
25/9/98 $2.8590
30/10/98 $2.6730
15/1/99 $2.6180
26/2/99 $2.55
26/3/99 $2.5320
25/6/99 $2.3780
3/2/00 $2.49
8/8/00 $2.5520
28/12/00 $2.6780
29/3/01 $2.9010
27/9/01 $3.012

then steadily down to
3/9/03 $2.475
17/12/04 $2.5220
29/6/05 $2.3520

OzTennis

Amazulu

I don't think it will work. If you could predict exchange rates you would be very rich.....

OzTennis

It's pretty simple, it's the what goes up must go down principle (as my rates back to 1998 show). Seriously, I don't think a rate of over $2.50 is likely in the foreseeable future, given the relative strengths of the 2 economies, comparative interest rates etc. It has basically been in the $2.30's for the last 12 months.

OzTennis

OzTennis

"Many a pound/dollar/rand was lost for the want of a pound/dollar/rand in the first place." i.e. even if you could predict exchange rates you need plenty of money to be able to profit substantially from exchange rate movements.

OzTennis

lloydmav

wow didn't realise it had got as high as $3. Makes me feel quite hard done by when I change money now

At the end of the day its pretty useful information because I know that the exchange rate is not going to suddenly shoot back up and that probably the sooner I make the transfer the better..... anyways I probably wouldn't make much of a stock broker

OzTennis

Yes, but I've exchanged at $1.33 = £1 when moving $'s the other way but you have to go back to the early 80's for that.

OzTennis

mgilmour

The OzForex Guru will save you some leg work!
1. Monthly averages
2. Season trends
3. Yearly averages
...etc. Data back to 1990.
http://www.ozforex.com.au/forexguru.asp

When you work out how to predict the rate let us know!!!!

Regards
Matt Gilmour
OzForex.com.au

OzTennis

Thanks for that. Financial institutions will also cover themselves legally with the phrase 'past performance should not be regarded as being indicative of future performance' or words to that effect!

OzTennis

lloydmav

thanks for that, I'm always looking for ways of saving leg work, I'll let you know when I crack it