Us$ Nearly At 35

[Livinginexile]

I am paid in $US and I am loving the weekly increases in value against other currencies.

Makes a change from a year ago when the poor old greenback was a basketcase.

What a difference a year make huh?

I hope it hits 40 bht soon...any predictions?

[VegasVic]

I am paid in $US and I am loving the weekly increases in value against other currencies.

Makes a change from a year ago when the poor old greenback was a basketcase.

What a difference a year make huh?

I hope it hits 40 bht soon...any predictions?

The BOT has some very sizeable Dollar reserves and has made it quite clear where they want the Dollar to trade vs. the baht. There seems to be a split on the BOT BOD as to if they should do a 5% devaluation of the baht, if this occurs then you could enjoy up to a 37 baht/Dollar rate, but currently those calling for devaluation are not in the majority. It's not so bad for you getting paid in Dollars, those getting paid in pounds, euros, or aussie dollars must be a little ticked at the BOT's stubborness

[PeaceBlondie]

If the chart on Yahoo Financials is correct, the baht has begun another rise since November 17.

[dingdongrb]

I've been watching the UDS vs the Baht almost on a daily basis now for a year. I noticed the jump yesterday over the 35 Baht mark... I use x-rates.com

I would love to see it get back to the 40-45 mark where it was years ago when I first started coming here. Sure beats the 29-30 it was at only months ago...

[GungaDin]

I am paid in $US and I am loving the weekly increases in value against other currencies.

Makes a change from a year ago when the poor old greenback was a basketcase.

What a difference a year make huh?

I hope it hits 40 bht soon...any predictions?

Don't you just love the <deleted> braggers.

[jfchandler]

Two year Yahoo finance chart on U.S. $ vs. Thai baht... So basically, we're back to where we were almost two years ago... not so bad... from a historical perspective...

Now, if only my stock portfolio would start following the same trend line...

[davejonesbkk]

I get paid in dollars too and to be honest I'd much prefer a stable range of say 34-37 than fluctuations going down below 30 and up to 40....

[PeaceBlondie]

My pension is all in USD, and I would settle for a nice, flat, constant 40.

[Heng]

As would I. Although 35 is already pretty sweet.

[Lopburi99]

My pension is all in USD, and I would settle for a nice, flat, constant 40.

Ditto! Wouldn't life be sweet?!

Edited November 22, 2008 by Lopburi99

[torrenova]

You could have been looking at pre 1997 25 baht to the greenback. Now that would have been depressing and chronic for business !

[cclub75]

I've been watching the UDS vs the Baht almost on a daily basis now for a year. I noticed the jump yesterday over the 35 Baht mark... I use x-rates.com

I would love to see it get back to the 40-45 mark where it was years ago when I first started coming here. Sure beats the 29-30 it was at only months ago...

Watch out people... Short memory...

Do not trust the exchange rate 1 USD = 29 THB you can see on large western websites (like oanda, yahoo etc.). All the charts are wrong.

Why ? Because prior to march 3 2008... they were using off shore exchange rates.

Yes, i know it sounds like a century ago, but we have had capital controls in Thailand for more than 1 year, and therefore a dual market.

But... off shore rates were bullshit. The only "real" exchange rates were those offered by the thai banks in Thailand... The only place where you were able to buy THB...

History with SCB :

http://www.scb.co.th/exchange/bk-pvsexchange.htm

Look january for instance...

[Alwaysright]

I've been watching the UDS vs the Baht almost on a daily basis now for a year. I noticed the jump yesterday over the 35 Baht mark... I use x-rates.com

I would love to see it get back to the 40-45 mark where it was years ago when I first started coming here. Sure beats the 29-30 it was at only months ago...

Watch out people... Short memory...

Do not trust the exchange rate 1 USD = 29 THB you can see on large western websites (like oanda, yahoo etc.). All the charts are wrong.

Why ? Because prior to march 3 2008... they were using off shore exchange rates.

Yes, i know it sounds like a century ago, but we have had capital controls in Thailand for more than 1 year, and therefore a dual market.

But... off shore rates were bullshit. The only "real" exchange rates were those offered by the thai banks in Thailand... The only place where you were able to buy THB...

History with SCB :

http://www.scb.co.th/exchange/bk-pvsexchange.htm

Look january for instance...

I see a lot don't remember 25 to the dollar for years.I would like to see 55 again.

[jfchandler]

According to the Thai Visa exchange rate page...

The rate U.S. $ to baht one year ago today was 33.89

http://baht.thaivisa.com/currency-rate-on-2007-11-22.html

The rate today, based on the TV site, was 35.12

http://baht.thaivisa.com/currency-rate-on-2008-11-22.html

March and April 08 got down into the 31s....but it was better both before and after then.

Last saw 35ish rates around March-April 07...and then downward after that...

[lannarebirth]

$USD Index has just completed week 36 of it's 40 week Hurst Cycle. It could be expected it will break sharply into that time frame. It is showing some negative divergances (bearish) in it's daily chart, but it also has printed some patterns that come with higher targets. If the correction into it's 40 week cycle lows hold 83 (50/50 IMO), it will likely melt up. If it doesn't, will need to see the action of the ensuing cycle for guidance.

[jcon]

$USD Index has just completed week 36 of it's 40 week Hurst Cycle. It could be expected it will break sharply into that time frame. It is showing some negative divergances (bearish) in it's daily chart, but it also has printed some patterns that come with higher targets. If the correction into it's 40 week cycle lows hold 83 (50/50 IMO), it will likely melt up. If it doesn't, will need to see the action of the ensuing cycle for guidance.

Laymen's terms please, lanna?

So you're saying a weakening of the dollar, but against the THB or no? Because the BOT seems determined to keep this managed pseudo peg... or am I wrong?

[lannarebirth]

$USD Index has just completed week 36 of it's 40 week Hurst Cycle. It could be expected it will break sharply into that time frame. It is showing some negative divergances (bearish) in it's daily chart, but it also has printed some patterns that come with higher targets. If the correction into it's 40 week cycle lows hold 83 (50/50 IMO), it will likely melt up. If it doesn't, will need to see the action of the ensuing cycle for guidance.

Laymen's terms please, lanna?

So you're saying a weakening of the dollar, but against the THB or no? Because the BOT seems determined to keep this managed pseudo peg... or am I wrong?

I don't really look at the Baht much jcon, except when I wire funds.The USD:THB has broken some resistance recently and I expect that to act as support on any general pullback of the $USD in the next couple of weeks. I should have mentioned in the prior post that the last 20 week cycle was only 18 weeks long.If that repeats , this consolidation we're seeing could be its correction. Still, I don't lke negative divergances (internals telling a different tale than price) and I would expect some kind of pullback here. If it doesn't come, Uncle Buck is going to launch.

Don't know about the BOT. I take the view that news is meaningless. Time and Price are what matter most to me. The price will tell you what next weeks news will be.

[PeaceBlondie]

Except for a few apocalyptic apostrophes, Lannaarebirth writes excellent English until he melts into technical jargon. I hope his prediction is that the Thai baht:dollar exchange will melt into the 50's faster than ice cream on hot apple pie in Songkhla in April..

[JimsKnight]

and the £ hopefully going up with it as well

[samui04]

Except for a few apocalyptic apostrophes, Lannaarebirth writes excellent English until he melts into technical jargon. I hope his prediction is that the Thai baht:dollar exchange will melt into the 50's faster than ice cream on hot apple pie in Songkhla in April..

And the Euro will be at 100, just becaouse every other currency is going bad.....uk, swiss, singapore, iceland.....

[lannarebirth]

Except for a few apocalyptic apostrophes, Lannaarebirth writes excellent English until he melts into technical jargon. I hope his prediction is that the Thai baht:dollar exchange will melt into the 50's faster than ice cream on hot apple pie in Songkhla in April..

That may be a little overly optimistic PB, but it's 40 week cycle is due to bottom anyday now (if it didn't already on Thursday).

Edited November 29, 2008 by lannarebirth

[MeetJohnDoe]

Some market commentaries I have read predict 38 to $ sometime next year

That would be full circle for me...when I expatriated 10 years ago, it was 38...then weakened to 43/44/...and then stregenthed to 31 and now back down to around 36. Of course, the cost of living has increased greatly in 10 years

[hyperdimension]

My basic understanding of the fundamentals of currencies is that strong economies relative to other economies have strong currencies relative to those other economies.

We all know that the U.S. economy is currently unwell. So is it strange that the U.S. dollar has been so strong relative to most other currencies?

One popular explanation of the recent U.S. dollar strength is that non-U.S. investments are being unwound/liquidated/deleveraged and the money is then being converted back to U.S. dollars. The conversion of huge volumes of money is what moves currency exchange rates in a particular direction. The Australian dollar carry trade (due to Australia's high interest rate) would be one of these non-U.S. investments, and the recent extreme falls of the Australian dollar to the U.S. dollar may be evidence of this theory of unwinding.

If this theory is correct, then would this mean that once most of the unwinding is done, there may be a crash in the U.S. dollar due to the extremely sick U.S. economy?

[britmaveric]

Well problem with your theory is rest of the world economies are severly sick more so than yank economies. Signs are that yanks are getting out of their mess - not so for the rest of the world. $ is stable/safe - when things go to shi*e $ will always rise.

Look for 40-42 by mid 2009.

[Hairy]

Well problem with your theory is rest of the world economies are severly sick more so than yank economies. Signs are that yanks are getting out of their mess - not so for the rest of the world. $ is stable/safe - when things go to shi*e $ will always rise.

I don't know what "signs" you are referring to. From the ground here, there aren't any.

The media is trumpeting the great sales volume that happened on "Black Friday", the big blowout sale day to start the Christmas shopping season. Problem is, the reason that sales are beating expectations is that the expectations were set artificially low AND the sales promotions this year have been way over the top.

Saks Fifth Avenue had a "70% off everything in the store" sale. That should be a clearer indication of what the economy is like right now.

Look for 40-42 by mid 2009.

Wouldn't surprise me, but that's more because Thailand is shooting itself in the ass right now.

The USD is likely to tank next year because of the massive devaluation that is going on even as we type. The government is inflating the money supply to ward off deflation caused by the housing collapse. Problem is, when you print two dollar bills for every constant-dollar unit of real value, other people tend to reprice the currency exchange rates accordingly.

[britmaveric]

Maybe, but the rest of the world is in worst shape - so long term $ is King.

[Hairy]

Maybe, but the rest of the world is in worst shape - so long term $ is King.

The whole rest of the world? Australia has zero national debt. China is set to slow down horribly to only 9% growth.

The U.S. has about US$10,000,000,000,000 in federal government debt alone, considerably more when you take into account state and local governments, and when you throw in consumer debt your computer will run out of storage space. It's all a house of cards, and the mortgage crisis was just the first round. We're not even into the second stage of the residential mortgage crisis yet -- forget the commercial real estate crash that's getting started now -- and we're already in deep trouble.

Yes, Britain is thoroughly sodomized, and Iceland has frozen over, and Ukraine is bankrupt, and Italy is business as usual, but these aren't the whole rest of the world.

I think the key difference is that politicians elsewhere are constrained by some sense of reality. Politicians in the U.S. think that the rest of the world is so thoroughly tied to the U.S. that they cannot possibly let us fail, that the rest of the world will bankrupt themselves before letting us fail. It's just not going to happen; the rest of the world is not going to commit suicide in order to let Chase-JPM executives take home multimillion dollar bonuses year after year forever.

[britmaveric]

Unfortunately - Oz/China and most of the world is involved with subprime mortgage mess - hate to tell you this, but yes they are in the shi*e too.

[hyperdimension]

would this mean that once most of the unwinding is done, there may be a crash in the U.S. dollar due to the extremely sick U.S. economy?

There's an article specifically about the recent strength of the U.S. dollar, and also an article on the crash of the Australian dollar in Currency Trader November 2008.

Also have a look at Currency Trader October 2008 for those who are interested.

[hyperdimension]

From ANZ Economic Outlook - December quarter 2008:

Australian equity markets have been discounted as heavily as the US despite better fundamentals

Stepping back from the daily gyrations in financial markets, it is worth noting that while the Australian share market has been punished as much as the US market – the S&P/ASX 200 has fallen 31% since 1 July 2007, just before the crisis erupted, compared with a 34% decline in the US S&P 500 – the fundamentals of the Australian economy remain infinitely better than the US, and indeed, any other industrialised economy for that matter.

The local banking sector is profitable and well capitalised, has maintained prudent practices in relation to residential loans, and has not been exposed to sub-prime mortgages and related

securities as overseas banks have.

The economy is also entering the current period of turmoil from a position of strength. While economic growth is slowing it should remain well supported. In particular, the corporate sector is healthy and investment intentions remain strong. And while the labour market has softened, it is still tight and there is no indication that the business community is about to shed labour en masse. Meanwhile, residential construction is likely to be bolstered by strong pent-up demand and interest rate cuts.

A third major point of distinction with other industrialised economies is that Australian policy makers have significantly more scope to prime the economy if conditions deteriorate unacceptable, a point underscored by the 100bp interest rate cut by the RBA and the federal government’s $10.4bn fiscal stimulus package. It seems clear, then, that the Australian sharemarket is well positioned to recover strongly when risk aversion finally recedes.