Template talk:Exchange Rate

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Per discussion below (#Principle of quoting exchange rate on an arbitrary date) and at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Numismatics, exchange rate snapshot has been removed. For its old instruction, see [1].

1 Instruction
2 Style guide
3 Caveat
4 Choice of currencies
- 4.1 See also
5 Problem With This Template
6 Principle of quoting exchange rate on an arbitrary date
7 Table Historical exchange rates...

[edit] Instruction

It is very easy to use this template. You will know right away when you see this example:

{{Exchange Rate|TWD}}

which produces

Current TWD exchange rates

Use Yahoo! Finance:	AUD CAD CHF EUR GBP HKD JPY USD
Use XE.com:	AUD CAD CHF EUR GBP HKD JPY USD

[edit] Style guide

[edit] What to include on the static copy

The exchange rate must include USD, EUR, JPY, and GBP. The first two must be USD and EUR, but the ordering between the two depends on the importance in trade, from the perspective of the currency in question. The same applies on JPY and GBP. Use import and export partner data on the CIA World Factbook to decide.
Add other foreign currencies that are important, such as the Russian ruble to the currencies of CIS members.

[edit] Date

Per Wikipedia:Manual of Style (dates and numbers), use one of the format between [[February 17]], [[1958]] and [[17 February]] [[1958]] that is appropriate for the currency.
There is such thing as time zone. If you can, try to update it around noon UTC so that 17 February actually means 17 February in most part of the world. If you can't, use the currency's time zone. For example, if the editor is in Morocco (UTC+0), and is updating the exchange rate of the Singapore dollar (UTC+8) at 23:00, 17 February UTC+0, then it is already 18 February in Singapore. Use 18 February.
It is recommended to update the static rate during weekends. The exchange rates generally don't fluctuate during weekends
Avoid contradiction. Exchange rate between 2 important currencies such as USD and EUR is listed on both articles. If you update the USD article when trade is open, and then you update the EUR article the next minute on the same day, the rate may have change already. However, the date listed could be the same and therefore creating an illusion of contradiction. This goes back to the recommendation of updating during weekend.

[edit] Numbers

1 home unit = x foreign units v.s. 1 foreign unit = y home units? Use the preferred format at home. But if you don't know, it's ok to use good common sense.
It is generally discouraged to use the format like "100 foreign units = x home units".

[edit] Other guideline

"British pound" redirects to "pound sterling". It is generally better to avoid redirects.
Update at par currencies all together at the same time, such as (South African rand, Lesotho loti, Swazi lilangeni, and Namibian dollar) and (Pound sterling, Falkland Islands pound, Gibraltar pound, Saint Helena pound, Guernsey pound, Jersey pound, and Manx pound)
Use symbol for the home currency if possible. But it has to be correct down to the position (relative to the numerals). However, it is OK to add a space between the symbol and the number for readability, as the number usually has 6 significant digits. If you are not sure, fall back to the three letter code. Central bank websites are a good source for authoritative information.

Correct:

$1, $ 1.23456, 10¢, 1.23456 ¢, £5, 500 Kč

Incorrect:

1$, ¢10, 5£, 500Kč, Kč 500

If symbols are used, include disambiguation letters/symbols, such as A$ for Australian dollar.

Under these principle, two distinct examples can be found above.

[edit] Caveat

"Current XYZ exchange rates" looks like a section title, but it's not. This was done to "remove" the edit buttons on the right so that people won't accidentally change the template. However, the side effect of that is the font size won't change in IE (at least IE6) if I enlarge or shrink my font size.

[edit] Choice of currencies

(This section is a casual talk of the author. The author does not guarantee the accuracy of any data here.)

It is hard to determine which currencies are major or of great importance. I finally settled down with the 11 listed above. According to the data on wikipedia itself when I wrote this, these 11 currencies covered 82% of the world GDP (nominal), 75~76% using PPP, and 57% of the world population. I only included the 22 principle countries (12 in eurozone + the other 10) for simplicity of calculation. These ratios are expected to be higher if you include other countries/region that use currencies or will be using (e.g. new E.U members).

Here are a few more candidate currencies if we were to add more. The rank is the rank excluding the currencies already on the list.

Currency	Rank					Regional Importance
Currency	GDP (nom)	GDP (PPP, IMF)	GDP (PPP, World Bank)	GDP (PPP, CIA)	Population	Regional Importance
South Korean won	1	1	1	1	14
Indonesian rupiah	9	2	2	2	1	Southeast Asia
New Taiwan dollar	5	3		3	34
Swiss franc	2	21	18	18	76
Turkish new lira	3	5	3	5	9	Middle East
Swedish krona	4	18	15	17	67
South African rand	11	4	6	8	15	Southern Africa
Argentine peso	13	8	5	7	18	South America

[edit] See also

Real discussion below

This table's criteria seem absurd to me. While the Swiss franc is completely backed by gold and the per capita income of the Swiss is high, the Turkish new lira started sliding again just like the old one because of overprinting and the per capita income of the Turks is low. That Turkey has ten times as much population as Switzerland makes Turkey as important? Please! --Q43 13:18, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

I can see your point. But ultimately, I didn't include the Turkish new lira, nor did I include Indonesian rupiah, which also has a bad record of inflation. I'd like to make 2 points about the table.

It is just a tool for making such decision. By no mean should we follow this table blindly.
At the same time, it is a necessary data for make such decision.

--ChoChoPK (球球PK) (talk | contrib) 13:09, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

I've removed 6 of those currencies. While they might be noteworthy locally in some regions, they are not of consequence internationally. The Chinese currency may be re-added at a later date as the economy becomes more and more influential, however at this time it's not absolutely crucial to the world's economy. +Hexagon1 ^(t) 05:10, 4 November 2006 (UTC)

JPY is definitely more significant than AUD and CHF. IMHO, the original list is adaquet. It somewhat matches the list on xe.com. And it is possible to extend the template so that additional currencies can be optioanally added. Reverting now. --ChoChoPK (球球PK) (talk | contrib) 01:23, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

Oh, I didn't mean to remove the yen. My bad on that. But my point remains valid, that table still includes a rather large amounts of unnecessary currencies. I don't think currencies such as Brazilian Reais and Mexican Pesos are of huge significance globally. +Hexagon1 ^(t) 04:16, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

Bottom line is, we have different threshold of "significance". The two of us can argue all day long here what the threshold should be. The truth is, it's arbitrary. How do you propose we resolve this? Bring this up to Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Numismatics? --ChoChoPK (球球PK) (talk | contrib) 04:28, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Problem With This Template

I realized that when I made some changes that were useful to the Turkish new lira in its own article, those changes affected all articles where this template is used! —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Q43 (talk • contribs) 11:17, 13 June 2006 (UTC).

This is what a template is for, for things that are common to many article. So when you need to change something, e.g. remove a "major" currency, you only need to do it in one place. and you don't need to duplicate the effort. --Chochopk 18:21, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

Yes, but what happens when in a certain article one needs to add a "minor" currency? --Q43 13:12, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

There is a way, see http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Template_talk:Foreach and http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Help:Array. But I'm afraid this is not my priority now. --Chochopk 02:41, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Principle of quoting exchange rate on an arbitrary date

IMO, it is not a good idea in principle to quote exchange rates as at some arbitrary date. It is not sustainable and not encylopedic. An annual average is far more useful.

It is not sustainable because it is unrealistic to expect that it will be revised for all currencies every day. Anyone who needs to know the actual daily rate will use a reliable source like XE.COM or OANDA.COM
It is not encyclopedic because, by capturing the rate on an arbitrary date, no useful understanding of long term price is conveyed to the reader.

The historical exchange rates (since 1990) that are given in Exchange rates section of the Economy of the United Kingdom entry, are far more useful. Spikes are smoothed and the reader gets a far better idea of the relative prices and how they move over time. It only needs to be updated once a year and the exact date is not critical. --Red King 16:38, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

Well said. I would like to hear more opinions from others. --ChoChoPK (球球PK) (talk | contrib) 16:45, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

Removed. --ChoChoPK (球球PK) (talk | contrib) 07:53, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Table Historical exchange rates...

What if we listed Historical exchange rates? For example, the National Bank of the Republic of Belarus provides historical rates for the Belarusian ruble. You would get the information from the countries web site (assuming they provide it). If no information is provided on the countries web site The CIA's | The World Factbook has the data compares other countries currency to the United States dollar.

I am not an expert at tables, but it could look something like this:

--Historical Exchange Averages--

Period	Belarusian rubel official average exchange rate against
Period	Russian ruble	US dollar	Euro
2005
January	77.63	2 171.65	2 857.53
February	77.43	2 166.95	2 818.42
January – February	77.53	2 169.30	2 837.91
March	78.00	2 154.23	2 844.05
January – March	77.69	2 164.26	2 839.95
April	77.40	2 152.76	2 788.09
January – April	77.62	2 161.38	2 826.90
May	76.97	2 150.05	2 734.26
January – May	77.49	2 159.11	2 808.12
June	75.43	2 149.59	2 618.80
April – June	76.60	2 150.80	2 712.79
January – June	77.14	2 157.52	2 775.64
July	74.90	2 149.57	2 589.78
January – July	76.82	2 156.38	2 748.30
August	75.46	2 149.65	2 642.05
January – August	76.65	2 155.54	2 734.78
September	75.79	2 150.82	2 638.32
July – September	75.38	2 150.01	2 623.27
January – September	76.55	2 155.02	2 723.89
October	75.28	2 150.14	2 585.36
January – October	76.42	2 154.53	2 709.71
November	74.76	2 149.43	2 538.10
January – November	76.27	2 154.06	2 693.64
December	74.68	2 151.00	2 551.38
October – December	74.90	2 150.19	2 558.20
July – December	75.14	2 150.10	2 590.53
January – December	76.14	2 153.81	2 681.49