Thursday 1 December 2011

A Euro oddity.

Amazon have moved the Kindle market into Spain and Italy.  No complaints from me, the wider those Kindle books are available, the more likely it is that someone will buy one.

I had to go in and add pricing for all the books, which means they are likely to be offline for a day while they update. Can't be helped I suppose.

The easy option is to set the price in US dollars and then check the boxes that make the UK, Germany, France, Italy and Spain prices equivalent to the dollar price. It means the European prices fluctuate by a few pennies as the currencies move in relation to the dollar but it means the books are the same price everywhere.

What seemed odd to me was that currently, the French and German equivalent of a $1.99 price is euro 1.45. However, the Spanish and Italian equivalent is euro 1.50 (I don't have a keyboard with the euro sign. I should get one before they become collector's items).

It looks as if there is a different exchange rate between the dollar and the French and German euros than between the dollar and the Italian and Spanish euros.

Is that possible? Is the Eurozone breaking up? Or am I missing something?

Anyone out there understand international money markets?

16 comments:

John said...

Tax? I know we have VAT on ebooks here and the VAT rates vary across the EUSSR. Could that be it?

Conan the Librarian™ said...

€1.50

Alt 0128

KP said...

Is there anybody on the planet that understands international money markets? None of the tossers in charge at least.

However, I do understand keyboards - Ctrl-Alt-4 will get you a €.

You're welcome.

Chief_Sceptic said...

I don't understand it - but I do know that such fractional differences in exchange rates are where the "currency traders" live ..

monsieur deli delbois - derisitives dealer said...

pas de clue mon amie - but i believe you'll find that the only thing that matters is wot the wonga buys you when you convert the said europain currency back into one of her majesty's round ones. i'm currently holding an interesting position in drachmas, as it happens.

nisakiman said...

I find "Alt Gr and $" works for me.

Anonymous said...

Alt Gr + 4 gets me the euro sign. €. See?

Keep up the good work, LI.

Neal Asher said...

Aaargh! I've worn out three or four keyboards and I never knew that!

Anonymous said...

The € sign is on may keyboard just to the right of the number 4. Never knew how to get it until now! Thanks, KP.

Essentially, the Spanish central bank will decide the dollar/euro exchange rate for Spain, etc.

Anonymous said...

"Essentially, the Spanish central bank will decide the dollar/euro exchange rate for Spain, etc."

Except that isn't that all going to change now with the new "Stability Pact" that Cameron is over in Paris, no doubt busily agreeing to on our behalf, but without telling us the implications, which involves Germany taking fiscal control of all of Europe (yes, including the UK and other non-Euro countries) and thus enabling themselves to tax all European citizens to the hilt on everything in order to make up the money that they can't now get from previous lenders to short up the failing Euro?

prinz charlie von batzenburg said...

00:34

formal feudalism in britain collapsed after the first world-war when the lardarses of the manor owed the peasants one for digging drainage ditches in flanders designed to stop the tidal flow of german feudalism...

...one then fought another insane world-war against german feudalism, the ensuing social disintegration from which precipitated the near capitulation of the establishment, whose leadership, forced to submit to the conceptual infection of state-authorized communism, bought the peasantry off with the welfare safety-nappy...

...as a result of lessons learned from history, one is now being offered the european feudal union, a sort of super-safety-nappy, directly by germany, but, scandalously, one is being short-changed out of a futile and meandering world-war - it's quite bally absurd...

...in one's own private opinion.

reality cheque said...

03:25

don't worry charlie - when cameron comes back from munich inanely waving a recycled copy of the new european treaty, he's gonna get the choppety-chop and clarkson's gonna step up to lead us and fight the theiving krautmeisters on the beaches.

prinz charlie von batzenburg xviii said...

03:41

oh, thank heavens for that, rc - we brits will be deploying strictly environmentally friendly pedalos and wind-sailboards, one trusts...

st jezza d'arc said...

03:41

o god, don't tell me about cameron - i have to live next-door to the prize welly-booted buffoon and his overheight skunk hedge. come-on now...what d'you expect from a guy who, in the hope cultivating a tuft of positive self-publicity, cynically applauds a suicide...the man's an idiot.

i've been trying to redress the pro-top-u-self campaign, by-the-way...with a few hard-hitting home truths about what the afterlife looks like (the inside of a fox's stomach)...and how no-one really gives a flying-fuck-a-doodle-dandy if you do yourself in or not...

...dring, dring, the next station-stop will be beachy head.

talwin said...

€€€€€€€€€€€€€€

Sorry. Never seen that before. Just had to do it!

subrosa said...

jings, you all must be pc users. My Mac keyboard has € very accessible without hassle. :)

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