Andy M. asked: “How could one transfer approximately $100,000 in
British Pounds (in London) into a US dollar denominated bank account
(in NY) at the least expensive rate? I can't find any way to do it that doesn't
cost an arm and a leg. Lloyds bank, for
example, offer me a $1.76 exchange rate when the actual spot rate of the $ /
GBP is close to $1.86! I figured your
readers in their brilliance might have a suggestion for how people do
this.”
In your brilliance, you
replied:
Jay Glynn: Two
options for transferring the $100,000:
1) Have both a sterling account and a dollar account at Citibank in London. They
quote competitive spot rates for transfers.
2) Alternatively, Citibank Global Transfers allows the instant transfer
of funds between Citibank accounts, even in different currencies. I transferred a small amount (less than
$1,000) from dollars to pounds in early February and got a rate of $1.861. The spot rate was around $1.83. The English banks are notorious for ripping
off retail customers for large transfers.
They tend to have a higher minimum transfer to qualify for spot
rates. The American banks are more
reasonable.”
Jack Kouloheris
(ever ingenious): “What
about this: Avoid the banks. Use the pounds to buy some stable, highly liquid
security for which the spread and daily movement will be limited (Treasury
money market shares?), then journal the shares over to a US brokerage account and sell. Deposit in a US bank.”
Paul: “I live in Switzerland and would like to know of any good answers
to Andy M’s question. The best I've
heard of so far for doing a transfer from Europe to the US is the following I saw on a Swiss consumer
bulletin board:
24-Jul-03
Keith kwpinwdc My partner and I had the same problem, as bank fees
were becoming way too expensive to transfer money to/from the States. But we've
found a free method that's completely electronic. . . . Sign up for Paypal. This works
best if you have electronic banking with both your Swiss and U.S. banks. There are a few steps to get started [grayed, because most readers will skip them]:
Sign-up as a Swiss resident
(https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_international-register), using your
Swiss address. You will
then need to add the details of your Swiss bank account. Important: Choose the
option for a Personal account, not the Premier account. With the Premier
account, you can earn interest on your Paypal balance
and you get an ATM/debit card, but then you will also be charged a % fee on all
funds received. There are no fees with the Personal account.
Additionally,
add the details of your United States checking account. Paypal
will deposit two small amounts into your checking account (like 49 cents and 23
cents for example). This is how they verify that you are the account owner. You
then login to Paypal and enter these amounts from
your statement (easier if you have online access to your statements) to have
the account included.
Your Swiss
address needs to be verified in a similar manner. You have to have a Swiss
credit card and a small amount is credited to the credit card. Once you have
this amount from the statement, you enter it online to become verified.
You can then
add funds to your Paypal account from either your U.S. or Swiss bank accounts. It's a bit easier from the United States account. All you have to do is choose to add funds
from the account and the funds will appear in your Paypal
account within 2-3 days. To add funds to Paypal from
the Swiss account, you will need to order a bank transfer from the Swiss
Account to the Paypal bank account (which is Bank of
America in Geneva). You have to enter a unique code into the memo
section of the transfer to be sure they can credit the correct Paypal Account. This code is generated on Paypal when you request to add money from a Swiss account.
We do the transfer online through our bank (Basler Kantonalbank) and the transfer is free of charge.
Once you have
funds in your Paypal account, you can add them to
either your Swiss or U.S. bank accounts. The funds will be transferred within
3-4 days. So the money transfer works either direction. There is a 50 cent
charge to add money to a Swiss bank account, but it's free to add to a U.S. account.
So, it takes
about 5 days to get money from one point to another, but if you're not in too
much of a hurry, there are no fees (other than 50 cents). And the exchange rate
that Paypal uses is the same, if not better than any
bank's.
Brad Hurley: “A couple of friends of mine have reported
good experiences with the online currency exchange service XeTrade. However, my
brother found the best way of all to convert pounds to dollars. A few years ago, when my brother was trying to
lose some weight, his boss came up with a plan: instead of giving him a end-of-the-year bonus, he offered my brother $20 for every
pound he could lose during the year. If he gained the weight back, he'd have to
pay back the money. My brother lost 40 pounds and kept it off, and made $800.”
Tomorrow: Betting on Bush