I was looking at sites that give the exchange rates, but they all differ at what the exchange rate is right now. Some of the sights say that the exchange rate for USD:JPY is 1.00:108.73 and others sights say 1.00:108.88, 1.00:109.05, 1.00:109.15 or 1.00:109.50. I was wonding what is a good trust website that I can check what the exchange rate is.

All help would be much appreciated.

Thank you,
Amit

Currency rate changes by the second, and currency markets is open 24/7 around the world, unlike stocks. So, different sites will show the rate when it's last posted.

One of the better sites for currency is xe.com. As of 6/19 14:22GMT, it's showing 109.5yen to the dollar.

If you look at Yahoo Finance, for example, it says 108.730. But that's from 5:16ET Friday (6/18), which is like 18 hours ago.

Thanks, I did not know that the exchange rates are 24/7. I thought they closed when the stock market closes. I did see http://www.xe.com and others, but that one was very different from the other's that I thought that might have been a mistake.

Thank you,
Amit

It pays to read the site. As Xenon explains, there are buy and sell prices for each currency, the 'spread' between these prices providing the profit made by the exchange house, and varying considerably according to each house's view of its overheads and desired profit.

The price on the Xenon site is a mid-point between buy and sell prices, and as such reflects the relative value of two currencies given exchanges in two directions. It does not reflect a rate that you can actually obtain for yourself, and so does not represent the real costs which a visitor to one country, exchanging money in one direction only and then spending it, will incur in terms of his own currency. It's also an average of intermational money market rates, which are always 'better' from the tourist's point of view, than the tourist rate usually available over the counter. The rate obtainable from an ATM is much closer, even when commissions or service fees are accounted for.

The only right answer to what is the actual exchange rate sits in your palm once you've made the exchange, since rates fluctuate constantly, and if you fail to plan well you may find yourself forced to exchange money at the airport, where, of course, the rate will be much worse than anywhere else. The Xenon rate is at least produced by professionals, updated live 24 hours a day, and give you a benchmark against which to compare the greediness of the exchange bureau you are using.

Peter N-H
http://members.shaw.ca/pnhpublic/China.html

Amit, the difference between the lowest and highest rates that you list is only 0.77 yen per dollar. That's 77 yen on $100, so less than 1%. The 77 yen is worth about 67 cents, so to buy the same amount of yen, you would be paying between 100.00 and 100.67.

The yen that you could buy for $3000 at your best rate, would cost $3020 at the worst rate. Now, that $20 would be better off in your pocket than in a currency trader's but it is still less than a 1% difference.

At typical travel budget levels, the difference in those reference rates is not really that significant. They are all competitive rates.

I have an example of what Peter is referring to. At JFK airport, recently, they were selling 10,000 yen notes for $100. That's 100 yen per dollar. The next day at NRT, I got yen from the airport ATM at a rate of 110.xx per dollar.

this website can tell you all about exchange rates and give you real time INTERBANK rates

http://www.oanda.com/

you can even sign up to trade currencies yourself

If you are in the US, call Thomas Cook at 800.287.7362. I just called them the other day to get the exchange rate on the Singapore dollar. They have the 20 most asked about currencies recorded...if the currency that you are asking about isn't in the top 20, then an agent will come on the line and look it up for you.I use this service often. Happy travels!

And even if currency trading did stop "when the stock market closes", which stock market? The United States does not have a monopoly on currency trading, or on stock markets either, for that matter, and traders are beavering away all over the world.

While currency trading is indeed global and takes place round the clock, there is in effect little trading done over the weekend, i.e. from the close of business on Friday on the NY market and start of trading on the NZ/Australian market on Monday morning. In GMT it's around 9 pm on Friday till 9 pm on Sunday.
You can put a range of exchange rates for popular currencies on your desktop, updated every minute, from http://www.mgforex.com