Not everything is good but at least the dollar is getting even stronger.

The greenback is at its highest level in two decades, climbing another 1% on Thursday to just under 104 in the U.S. Dollar Index, marking its strongest level since 2002. The gauge measures the U.S. currency's strength against a basket of other developed world currencies, including the euro, yen, Canadian dollar and British pound. In fact, the greenback has advanced 7% since the beginning of the year, outpacing many assets from stocks and bonds to gold and bitcoin.

Commentary: "It's clearly a 'U.S. dollar is king' world," said Mingze Wu, a currency trader in Singapore at StoneX Group. "The dollar will continue to strengthen globally as long as rest of the world does not keep up in matching interest rate hikes." The greenback is also getting a haven bid along with Treasuries amid concerns about economic growth and a possible recession......
https://seekingalpha.com/artic...reakfast-king-dollar

Lol ok.

Measuring the dollar against “a basket of other currencies” is the rub. They’re all in a bubble.

All it takes is a look at the price of gold.

Pretty much all of the western world has been deficit spending for a LOOOOONG time. We just happen to have a tad more confidence in the dollar than other currencies.

The main reason that the US $ has gone up in value against the British £ and the €uro is because those currencies have gone down in value, as those countries import oil and natural gas from Russia, who has cutoff or reduced exports ever since the Ukraine War began. It’s all a shell game.

The US dollar is a very ugly fiat currency. However, right now it looks awfully pretty compared to the other fiat currencies.

It's so strong that everything that I used to buy is at least a dollar more per package or even over a dollar/lb more expensive.

It's about interest rates.

Raise interest rates, more foreigners like your currency, and sell theirs to buy yours.

quote:

Originally posted by slosig:
The US dollar is a very ugly fiat currency. However, right now it looks awfully pretty compared to the other fiat currencies.

^^^Bingo. It's not so much that the dollar is incredibly strong as it is all the Euro currencies are in decline given their economies have weakened substantially.

quote:

Originally posted by joel9507:
It's about interest rates.

Raise interest rates, more foreigners like your currency, and sell theirs to buy yours.

Especially when their currencies and economies are both in decline. Russia is playing this same interest rate game to shore up the Ruble.

Yup. I always keep track of the dollar compared to the euro. I remarked to my wife yesterday that it's a good time to go back to France in regards to the exchange rate.

quote:

Originally posted by slosig:
The US dollar is a very ugly fiat currency. However, right now it looks awfully pretty compared to the other fiat currencies.

Yep. To steal a line from Winston Churchill's description of democracy... The dollar is the worst currency, except for all the others.

quote:

Originally posted by SIG4EVA:
It's so strong that everything that I used to buy is at least a dollar more per package or even over a dollar/lb more expensive.

Indeed.

Well at least the Mercedes, Audi, or BMW motorcycle you have in mind to buy shouldn't be going up. I agree though, as bad as the dollar is, most other currencies are worse. Just think how strong it'd be if the idiots hadn't run up our debt another couple trillion.

quote:

Originally posted by 2BobTanner:
The main reason that the US $ has gone up in value against the British £ and the €uro is because those currencies have gone down in value, as those countries import oil and natural gas from Russia, who has cutoff or reduced exports ever since the Ukraine War began. It’s all a shell game.

My understanding is that some countries are boycotting Russian petroleum, but it's still running per contract to those accepting deliveries. Russia has made DOUBLE this last season on contracts. Since the Ruble was tied to gold and Russia is only accepting payment in rubles, the contracts continue with payments being made. Four countries have, ten have arranged it, despite the public hype their goverment is producing.

As for the dollar it might be showing some signs of strength, on the world market however the Saudi's are now accepting yuan in payment - not dollars. Given the Federal Reserve has created 80% of the dollars in circulation over the last few years, there is no stopping a readjustment and devaluation as we are already seeing - prices up over 25% and analysts claiming the published percentage of 8.5 inflation is actually 18%.

With a fourfold increase in dollars circulating the simple math says we are far from seing this roller coaster ride done. If there are that many more dollars in circulation, then why shouldn't we expect a 4x decrease in their buying power?

The stickers on the pumps are telling us something. It's a deliberate plan, not incompetence.

quote:

Originally posted by PowerSurge:
Measuring the dollar against “a basket of other currencies” is the rub. They’re all in a bubble.

All it takes is a look at the price of gold.

Yes, our approaching train wreck looks smaller than their train wreck.

The dollar and the Euro are now nearly even. Earlier this morning they were at 1 for 1. Not since 2002 have we seen that. My wife's parents are visiting from France in a few days to be here for the birth of our third child. Not good timing for them at all.

Meaning that our goods become more expensive to other countries. Thus, our exporters suffer.

quote:

Originally posted by Balzé Halzé:
The dollar and the Euro are now nearly even. Earlier this morning they were at 1 for 1. Not since 2002 have we seen that. My wife's parents are visiting from France in a few days to be here for the birth of our third child. Not good timing for them at all.

Source? I like that graphic and want to check other currencies. Thanks.

quote:

Originally posted by Blackmore:

Source? I like that graphic and want to check other currencies. Thanks.

It's from a currency app I have on my phone. I like the widget so I can monitor the euro on my home screen.

https://play.google.com/store/...ev.currencyconverter

quote:

Originally posted by Blackmore:


Source? I like that graphic and want to check other currencies. Thanks.

Oanda is a good source https://www.oanda.com/currency...=EUR&to=USD&amount=1

We just got back from the UK and can't believe the rate. It is the lowest I can remember- around 2008 it was 2 GBP to the dollar. The Big Mac index on the Economist is a good indicator of how it "should" be.

the UK was still expensive, in spite of the exchange rate bonus. Food was the most expensive I have seen it, and I have lived there for about 7 years. Lamb was GBP 13.50 per kilo, where even in FL you can get it for $6.99 per lb.