Hapa nimechanganyikiwa kidogo. I have a 100 USD dollar bill. If I want to convert it to Kenyan money, am I buying or selling? I am getting different answers
You have it!..you’re selling it!..
You are selling the dollar and buying kenya shillings
Then hapo naona nimegongwa na hizi bureau za town. I wanted 100 USD. I gave them 10,130 KES and they gave me 100 USD. Hapo nje I saw BUY is 97 and SELL is 104. When I want to exchange KES to USD, is that sell or buy? Hii kitu inanichanganyisha I feel stupit
Buy in this case means when you buy the dollar from them. So they are selling it to you at 104. If you sell the dollar to them, they will buy it from you at 97
thanks, all clear now. Last stupid question, if the dollar is so powerful why am I getting it at a loss when I sell it at 97 bob? People who are paid in USD in Kenya, does it mean there salary is less once they convert to KES? Then why do they continue to be paid in USD? Akili imekataa kufikiria
exchange bureaus have to make a profit dum dum…
There has to be a difference between buy and sell for the bureus to make a profit. Just like in any other business. If you want to sell dollars at 104, then you will need to hunt down american tourists yourself who are returning to the US and want to get rid of excess kshs. Hell they may even buy from you at 110 if you are lucky. But we all agree that this is tedious and cumbersome.
Being paid in dollars is actually better as its always the dollar that appreciates against the kshs. So for example 3yrs ago banks were selling for around 80. Now its 104. So essentially, you are actually being paid more now for the same thing 3 yrs back (about 25%) more.
The buy and sell price displayed at the bureaus is their price at which they themselves buy and sell the dollar.Forex is a business just like any other.The business owners(in this case the bureaus) buy at a lower price and sell at a higher price.Thats how profits are made in this business.
In the case of getting your salary in dollars,its very good because getting paid just 3,500 dollars per month that’s a lot of money in the local currency.But when you want to spend your dollars here you will have to convert to KES and in this case you will lose a little bit of your money because of the buy/sell margin which is the profit of the exchanges/banks.
Here’s a primitive way to know what rate applies when. We’ll use the indicative buy and sell rates the bureau gave you:
Multiply;
100 x 97 = 9700
100 x 104 = 10400
Going on, use the two figures i.e 9700 and 10400. Assume you have dollars and would like to know how much you’ll get in Kenya shillings. Take the lower figure i.e 9700
Let’s now assume that you have Kenya shillings and you’d like to acquire dollars. Take the higher figure i.e 10400
Bottom line, always use the rate which causes you the most loss or least profit.
(Samehea osungu. I’m typing this while taking a dump:D)
Boss, help a brother please… hio rate ya 104 iko bureau gani? Kindly let me know…nakuomba tafadhali.
Hio rate ya 104 utachomeka buda, the best rate in town now is 100.95
The difference is what’s known as a bid-spread ask in financial parlance!
You are confusing yourself deliberately since you want to impress us with dollars but the terms buying and selling remain the same like in any other market.
You wake up one morning and go to marikiti and exchange your shillings for mangoes (dollars), then later you take your mangoes to the estates and sell them in exchange for shillings.
Nothing changes, it’s only the name of the commodities being exchanged.
I was really hoping that there is a place changing for 104…I would take 1000s of dollars to them
Ktalk imejaa wajinga! Ama ni curricullum ya sikuhizi inaproduce wajinga?
Hizi ni masomo ya class 7 Business Education back in the days! SMH!!!
You are selling the USD and buying the Kenyan Shilling.
skuizi iko form one maths syllabus
Nilikuwa hapo Kimathi St Continental not too long ago, this is accurate, and that is only for the new $100 blue bills. The rate for the old $100 bill is between $97 - $98.
Somali’s can rival any forex bureau. I don’t know how they do it… But they are good at what they do. Nuff said