Monday, November 05, 2007
Is The Weak US Dollar Damaging Your Earnings?
The BBC today reported that supermodel Giselle Bundchen is now refusing to work for US Dollars and prefers to be paid in Euros because of the weakness of the US currency.
It's not just supermodels that will be concerned about accepting money in USD. UK superaffiliates, and some normal ones like me, who work with US programs and networks may also be worried about the USD/GBP exchange rates at the moment. I decided a while ago that since I save most of my income and therefore don't need to spend all of it each month, I may be better off leaving my US income in USD currency until a more advantageous time for converting to Sterling, so set up a USD business account with HSBC.
My biggest US based activity is Google Adsense, but actually that is too important a part of my earnings to not take each month, but other things like dollar cheques from Linkshare and OneNetwork now get paid into my USD account. The paying in book for the dollar account is absurdly large, and you can't help but feel it gives you improved status when going into the branch.
Actually dealing with branch staff was one of the other motivators in getting a USD account, because the problems I had with badly trained branch staff taking USD cheques for a UK account were seriously annoying.
I had imagined that paying USD cheques into my USD account would mean not having to pay the bank charges incurred with foreign currency cheques but unfortunately HSBC still take help themselves to a few quid for each cheque, although I think it may be possible to get around that with electronic transfer.
So now I have my USD account, I can just leave my US earnings in there until such a time that it makes more sense to change it over - unless of course the situation doesn't improve and my money becomes worth even less, so there's a slight gamble involved in doing this.
Another option would be to raise the payment thresholds on your US earnings to delay payment and hope the situation improves, but that is also a bit of a gamble and means you won't be earning interest on your money.
Has the sliding US dollar effected you, and have you taken any steps to protect your US based income?
It's not just supermodels that will be concerned about accepting money in USD. UK superaffiliates, and some normal ones like me, who work with US programs and networks may also be worried about the USD/GBP exchange rates at the moment. I decided a while ago that since I save most of my income and therefore don't need to spend all of it each month, I may be better off leaving my US income in USD currency until a more advantageous time for converting to Sterling, so set up a USD business account with HSBC.
My biggest US based activity is Google Adsense, but actually that is too important a part of my earnings to not take each month, but other things like dollar cheques from Linkshare and OneNetwork now get paid into my USD account. The paying in book for the dollar account is absurdly large, and you can't help but feel it gives you improved status when going into the branch.
Actually dealing with branch staff was one of the other motivators in getting a USD account, because the problems I had with badly trained branch staff taking USD cheques for a UK account were seriously annoying.
I had imagined that paying USD cheques into my USD account would mean not having to pay the bank charges incurred with foreign currency cheques but unfortunately HSBC still take help themselves to a few quid for each cheque, although I think it may be possible to get around that with electronic transfer.
So now I have my USD account, I can just leave my US earnings in there until such a time that it makes more sense to change it over - unless of course the situation doesn't improve and my money becomes worth even less, so there's a slight gamble involved in doing this.
Another option would be to raise the payment thresholds on your US earnings to delay payment and hope the situation improves, but that is also a bit of a gamble and means you won't be earning interest on your money.
Has the sliding US dollar effected you, and have you taken any steps to protect your US based income?
Permalink // posted by Rob @ 4:41 PM 
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Yeah, part of our revenue stream is adsense earnings so we're taking a hit on USD-to-GBP conversions. Adsense revenue is inconsistent too at the moment - a double whammy!
We haven't yet opened a USD account for our dollar earnings (amazon.com being one) but it's something we may consider. A mate of mine was running a USD account back in 2004/5 for his adsense revenue - though second guessing the currency markets is something I know much about personally.
We haven't yet opened a USD account for our dollar earnings (amazon.com being one) but it's something we may consider. A mate of mine was running a USD account back in 2004/5 for his adsense revenue - though second guessing the currency markets is something I know much about personally.
I'm also suffering from it but it's something I'm prepared to sit out. I wouldn't want to hold my Google AdSense payments, even if it did cost me in poor exchange rates.
I've also recently changed one of my sites into a dollar accepting site from GBP. The thing there is most of my customers are outside of the UK so it's a catch 22 - accept US $, get a poor exchange rate but the possibility of more orders or just accept GBP, and possibly put off customers.
I haven't considered Euro's yet but if the USD:GBP exchange rate gets even worse, I may well have to.
I've also recently changed one of my sites into a dollar accepting site from GBP. The thing there is most of my customers are outside of the UK so it's a catch 22 - accept US $, get a poor exchange rate but the possibility of more orders or just accept GBP, and possibly put off customers.
I haven't considered Euro's yet but if the USD:GBP exchange rate gets even worse, I may well have to.
Thanks for the comments guys.
John - I don't know too much about the currency markets either :-). But most of the commentators talk about the current exchange rates as if they are out of the ordinary, so I'm assuming (hoping?) at some point there will be a correction.
David - Like you, I wouldn't want to not get my Adsense payments so still take them monthly, it's just other bits and pieces that aren't critical to my income, I can just leave in the USD account and forget about.
John - I don't know too much about the currency markets either :-). But most of the commentators talk about the current exchange rates as if they are out of the ordinary, so I'm assuming (hoping?) at some point there will be a correction.
David - Like you, I wouldn't want to not get my Adsense payments so still take them monthly, it's just other bits and pieces that aren't critical to my income, I can just leave in the USD account and forget about.
Rob, have you tried WidgetBucks yet? I've been earning almost twice as much with WidgetBucks compared to AdSense. Plus, the ads are optimized for WordPress, Blogger, and even TypePad. Check out this WidgetBucks review for some more info.
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Permalink // posted by 
: 7:34 AM
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