South Korea’s Forex Reserves Up

Seoul, South Korea, reported a $3.29bn increase in their foreign exchange reserves at $205.45bn last March 2005 compared to February’s. Together with Japan and China, South Korea’s foreign exchange reserves will amount to $1.66 trillion cumulatively. The increase makes South Korean exports more expensive in the US making trading difficult and the reason why the South Korean government found the increase unfavorable.

The Won, South Korea’s currency, has rapidly increased against the dollar for the past months. In fact, South Korea follows Japan as the world’s fourth largest country in terms of foreign exchange reserves holding more than $200bn in total.

In lieu of this, the South Korean Central Bank will be attending the annual meeting of the Inter-American Development on Okinawa, Japan. South Korea will also hold three-way talks with Japan and China this coming May during the conference of the world’s central banks chiefs to discuss a number of ways to coordinate with the said countries on the issue.

Source: S Korea Not To Diversify Forex Reserves, The Peninsula Website

Convert Currencies With Visa’s New Website

Looking for a reputable website for the latest foreign exchange rates? Drop by Visa’s Currency Conversion website.

Meant to help cardholders prepare for travel, the new Visa website is the only site that approximates the rate that cardholders will receive when using their Visa card internationally. The website is different from other forex websites in the aspect that the latter base their rates on commercial markets.

The new website equips cardholders a safe, convenient and cost-effective way to pay when traveling internationally by knowing immediately what they’ll be paying for in the local currency. With useful travel and security tips, the website allows users to print out a helpful currency calculator that includes the appropriate Global Customer Assistance Center hotline for customer assistance in the event their cards gets lost while traveling.

However, the website’s currency feature becomes more accurate only when the cardholder knows the optional issuer markups that some banks assess on international transactions since the issuing bank determines the cardholder pricing structure. The cardholders receive from their issuer an effective foreign exchange rate that is typically better than converting cash at a local currency dealer.

Source: Visa Launches Currency Conversion Website, xtvworld.com