[newbee]

Hi all,

With the huge fall in the USD recently, and seeing that HKD is pegged to the USD; for those who have home offices in Europe/Canada/Singapore, etc, how do you hedge against the falling currency?

For example, I'm a Canadian working in the US but going to HK, so with the strong Canadian dollar, compared to my friends back home, my salary is just falling by the month!!

Seems like there is a lot of volitaility in currencies out there. A friend of mine signed a contract last year in Yen, when it was strong and now he's lost something like 20% of his value and is thinking of quitting too.

Any chance that the HK goverment will choose to unpeg? any word on the street? =)

For those seasoned expats, what are your views on this?

[freeier]

i've started going towards RMB as a hedge.
The key fluctuation against USD wld be benchmark to the RMB.
HKD will lag behind RMB in the currency movement.. so if u go for a RMB switch u'd probably have chance to switch back to hkd and enjoy your 2nd ride of the revaluation wave..

hope this make sense to u

[lowlight]

HK probably wouldn't unpeg until China does, and in that case, that'd probably peg to RMB.

[newbee]

do you mean to say you exchange all your HKD to RMB? or you changed it in the contract with your firm? I assume you're not talking about your own business.

[HK_Newbie100]

you could open up a mini forex account and short USD against any major currency like Euro. If you opt for the mini account which you can open up with just a few hundred dollars, the leverage becomes well diluted and you can use that as a pure hedging facility. Make sure it's the mini account that you open, as even one full standard forex contract is pretty scary stuff.

[Dageshi]

www.oanda.com might be a good option, I do some currency trading and they would be a pretty good choice for hedging. You can effectively bet as little or as much as you like for every 0.0001 or 0.001 (depends on the currencies) move in a particular exchange rate. I think now might be a good time, I don't expect the dollar to have a good year

[penguinsix]

You can have in your contract that you get a currency readjustment every six months to reflect the average exchange rate. That is common for many who work overseas (many Americans have that in Europe to help with the falling dollar).

[newbee]

Thanks for the advice, unfortunately, I'm not too sophisticated in shorting/margin trading so I think I wouldn't do that. Unless anyone would care to teach me!

[sebbb]

Hi,

i am with you newbee:
- for the protection against falling HK$,
- ... and for the lesson taking...

i did not anderstand much of the discussions that were held on the forum due to techinicality...