51+ currencies in stock
Trade 78 currencies
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USD CAD exchange only!
USD & CAD accounts required
Call for details 1-888-666-5977
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47,000+ Customers
200,000+ Transactions
300 Million+ Exchanged
Why Sell to Us?
Visiting Canada with your home currency on hand? No problem. We can convert 78 currencies to Canadian dollars in 4 of our locations. Our rates is guaranteed to be better than other similar businesses in airports or tourist destinations. Why? We are a business established in the local communities and looking for repeat businesses, not a one-time deal.
Studying in Canada is a long journey and take years to accomplish. A good currency exchange broker can save you a lot of money during your stay in Canada. Our rates to purchase currency from you can earn you up to 2% more than local banks. Why? Banks have so many locations and their operating costs are much higher.
Currency exchange rates go up and down 24/7 and creates many opportunities to invest in Toronto, Winnipeg or North York. Do you take advantage of the weak Canadian dollar or strong US dollar to invest in Canada? Take additional advantage to buy/sell foreign currency with Currency Mart instead of major banks.
Do you know, in general, Canadian banks make more profit by purchasing foreign currencies from customers than selling foreign currencies to customers? For example, banks make 5% profit by buying foreign currencies from customers, but only 3% profit to sell foreign currencies to customers. Currency Mart's foreign currency buy-in rate is guaranteed better than the major banks. On average, our profit margin is only 1%.
Why Buy from Us?
Are you travelling to overseas countries? No problem. Currency Mart has 51 foreign currencies in stock daily such as US Dollar, Euro, Japanese Yen and Pound Sterling and can bring in an additional 20 foreign currencies in 1-3 business days. More than sell foreign currency to you, we take care of your leftover money too. Bring your foreign currency bills back to us within 30 days from the date of purchase, with your receipt, we will buy back up to 30% of your total purchase at the same rate.
Mexican Peso, East Caribbean Dollar or Costa Rican Colon? No problem. We have them all either in stock or 1-3 days notice. Are you thinking about exchanging money, either before your departure or after your arrival? A hassle-free vacation starts from having foreign cash on hand. In general, our exchange rates are better than overseas travel destinations or hotel front desks. The same idea as coke is cheaper in supermarkets than in convenient stores.
When you have a bank account in the USA, we can wire transfer US dollars to your account for only $35.00(cad) no matter the wire amount, so no need to bring US cash with you. Savings can be hundreds of dollars per year.
Bringing USD cash for shopping in the US is a far better idea than credit cards. Most credit cards charge a 2.5% convenience fee, which is on top of the exchange rates. Besides, you have no idea what rates credit card companies have applied until after the transaction. Our USD to CAD rate is about 2% cheaper than major Canadian banks.
Shopping on Amazon US site or paying off your US dollar credit card? Purchasing a US Dollar cheque to pay off your credit card is cheaper than purchasing US Dollars from your bank. Deposit our USD cheque onto your credit card account, up to 2% savings from the exchange rate.
Many Canadians think about purchasing/renting a property in the USA, and we can help. By taking up to 2% off from Canadian dollar to US dollar exchange rate compared to major banks, we can help make your dream a reality and the savings can be thousands.
Frequency Asked Questions
A few reasons make our currency exchange rates better than banks'. Mainly, we deal with more customers than banks because banks can only deal with customers who have accounts with them. More clients make our operation more efficient and drive our average transaction cost down, so we can afford to offer foreign exchange rates better than banks. Additionally, our locations are for optimizing currency exchange business only, such as downtown cores or shopping centres. Oppositely, banks are everywhere, but some places are no demands at all. Again, currency exchange oriented location makes our operation more efficient.
The majority of our foreign currency banknotes are still from banks. Besides, all our retail locations have with state-of-the-art bill counters which recognize denominations and detect counterfeit bills.
The Canadian government agency, FINTRAC, issued the currency exchange business license to Currency Mart and renewed every two years. Our license No. is M11432814. Please verify our license by name from the FINTRAC website. FINTRAC Currency Mart has four foreign exchange service locations registered with FINTRAC, in Cargill building of Winnipeg downtown, in St. Vital Shopping Centre of Winnipeg, in Richmond-Adelaide Centre of Toronto downtown PATH and Yonge Sheppard Centre of North York.
Coins are too heavy to ship around the globe. Currency shipping requires unique security measurement, so the shipping cost can easily over the value of coins. None of our locations in Winnipeg and Toronto deals with coins. In fact, not only us, almost all currency exchange dealers are not deal with coins.
Currency Mart does not have a limit for currency exchange amount, and customers can exchange any amount. However, there are a few limits customers may need to know. The debit card limit is from $500 to a few thousand a day, pending on your account. Cash withdraw from bank branches for both USD and CAD is usually $3000 per day without reservation.
The answer is Yes and No. Most similar currency exchange a dealer need to convert one foreign currency to Canadian dollar first before they can exchange to another foreign currency. That means those dealers make money twice. Currency Mart can do a better job, we can directly convert foreign currencies to US dollars or from USD to other foreign currencies, but for foreign currency other than USD, we still have to exchange to CAD first.
In most countries, currency exchange activity is legal as long as the operator is registered for proper license from regulators. For example, the regulator is FINTRAC in Canada, Australia is FINTRAN and USA is FINCEN.
The requirements for foreign exchange operators are different in each country, but rules are really similar.These requirements are:
All these policies are targeting money laundering, fraud and terrorist activities. Individuals for small amounts, irregular exchange with reasonable source of fund evidence, should not worry about these policies.
Individual foreign exchange dealers at shopping malls, city centres and border crossings are your best chance to exchange foreign currencies to Canadian dollars.
Banks and credit unions in Canada only deal with customers with bank accounts with them, so not tourist friendly. Hotel front desk, foreign exchange kiosks in airports, and tourist hotspots are too convenient for visitors, so the fees are extremely high.
Individual foreign exchange dealers at shopping malls, city centres and border crossings are targeting the foreign exchange demand of local residents by offering exchange rates better than financial institutions, longer service hours and immediate available foreign currency inventory.
Calling each foreign exchange dealers and asking for a quote will find you the best exchange rate.
Firstly, the exchange rate is time sensitive information. The best exchange rate provider of your last deal may not offer the best exchange rate currently.
Secondly, the exchange rate is currency dependent. A foreign exchange dealer offers the best exchange rate for the United States dollars may not have the best exchange rate for the Euro dollars.
Thirdly, the actual exchange rate applied is payment restricted. For example, the exchange rate for electronic payment is much better than cash settlement, due to the cost of fraud, lost or stolen.
Finally, the exchange rate is also pending on inventory level and currency trend. In case of overstock and downtrend, a foreign exchange dealer is more likely to offer a better exchange rate than usual to speed up sales.
Due to all the driving factors above, only calling each foreign exchange dealer and asking for a quote can get you the best exchange.
Figure out a way to find someone who needs the currency you have and has the currency you want and willing to trade a certain amount at the current rate of this moment, will find you a way to exchange currency for free.
Exchange money at home is a better option for you.
Currency exchange is an activity of exchanging one currency to another. Foreign exchange activities are happening 24/7 and variations are huge. Exchange amounts vary from hundreds to trillions. Participants range from individuals to central banks. And payment time can be days or months. These unique characteristics distinguish foreign exchange from other trading activities.
Foreign exchange industry operates in a tiered market system to ensure efficiency and profitability. Top tier players are international banks, such as Deutsche Bank, J.P Morgan Bank, HSBC etc. They deal with second tier money changers, like local commercial banks, credit unions and money exchange dealers. These second tier money changers service the general public. For a small amount of money exchange, money changers are more efficient than larger banks, since the operating costs are lower.
Foreign exchange markets trade 24 hours/day, 7 days/week.. The trading activities are switched between different major financial hubs. For example, when the New York market opens in the morning, the Hong Kong and Tokyo markets in Asia are closed. When the New York market closes, the London market has been operating for a few hours already. Major banks have trading floors in each financial hub, so they can carry on their trade. Major financial hubs are London, New York, Dubai, Singapore, Tokyo and Hong Kong.
The exchange rate of each money exchange dealer is different. Because each dealer sets up its own rates based on the interbank rate (wholesale rate). That is why rates are similar but different for each dealer.When second tier dealers buy foreign currencies from top tier banks, they add a fraction number on top of the interbank rate as their profit. The same idea applies to selling transactions too. The larger the fraction number, the worse the rate is; the smaller the fraction number, the better the rate is. Following, but not limited to the following, factors determine the buy or sell rate.
The interchange bank rate is a 5 digits decimal number which constantly changing . The number was the actual exchange rate of the last executed deal between 2 banks. That is why the name of the rate is interbank rate. Every second, top tier banks match up buyers and sellers to make deals and publish the rate for the last deal. That is why the interbank rate is always changing.
For a standard foreign exchange transaction, the amount is $100K, so the 5th digit of the decimal number represents $1. Dealers need to subscribe to this information from Reuters or Bloomberg.
These up to seconds rates only make sense for large amount trading. Most second tier money changers publish their rates every hour or even once a day. To lock in the rate, dealers have to set up their locked in rate far worse than their up to seconds wholesale rate. Generally speaking, the longer the locked-in period, the worse the exchange rates are.
Direct quotes and inverse quotes are 2 expressions of exchange rates.Direct Quote:A direct quote uses an amount of local currency to describe 1 unit of foreign currency. For example, 1 USD=1.33567 CADInverse Quote:An inverse quote used an amount of foreign currency to describe 1 unit of local currency. For example, 1 CAD=0.74868 USDThese 2 expressions are interchangeable. The formulas are 1 / direct quote=inverse quote and 1 / inverse quote=direct quote.
For stock and real estate transactions, buyers trade with sellers, but not for foreign currency exchange. The counterparties of money exchange are dealers who trade currencies for profit. Reasons are that currencies, amounts and rates, as well as delivery times are all different. The customized transactions make it almost impossible to find counterparties. Introducing dealers to foreign exchange solved the problem above. Dealers buy the currencies from sellers at discounted rates and sell the currencies to buyers at surplus rates. The profits keep attracting dealers to provide foreign exchange service.
There are 4 variations that make each transaction differ to others, currencies, rates, amounts and payments.
There are 195 countries in the world, but only 180 exchangeable currencies. Most currencies are tradable, such as United States dollars and Canadian dollars. While a few currencies have trading limits due to government restrictions, like the Chinese Yuan. Only a few currencies are restricted for trade at all, for instance, Iran Rial and Cuba peso. The tradability of a currency determines how well the exchange rate is and how many payment methods. In general, free trade currencies have very good rates and plenty of payment options. But, the cost of trading restricted currencies are much more undesirable and limited payment options.
The exchange rate is calculated based on the mid-market rate (wholesale rate) plus or minus the spread (profit). The spread varies depending on particular currencies, exchange amounts and delivery time, as well as payment method. Generally speaking, rates are better for common currencies, larger trade amounts and wire payments.
The exchange amounts vary from hundreds to trillions and have a huge impact on rates. The cost of conducting a foreign exchange transaction is almost identical, but the profit is not. The profit of a $100K transaction is almost 10 times as much as a $10K trade. There is room for dealers to offer better rates to attract larger transactions. The cost of a trade is almost the same as the profit of a small amount trade, so there is no room for dealers to reduce the rates further. That is why rates for larger amount transactions are better than small amount trades.
Payments
Payments can be as simple as instant cash or complex as a wire transfer settlement at a predetermined date. Each type of payment is associated with different costs and time to fit different scenarios. For instance, a cash payment involves a cash handling fee and a secure shipping fee. The fees above may cost up to 1% and goes up with payment amount. Due to the facts above, the cash payment best fits an instant small amount spot exchange. But, a wire transfer has a higher fixed initial cost, 2-5 days settlement time frame. The benefit of wire payment is the cost stays constant regardless of the amount. Wire is the best fit for large foreign exchange.
Based on the variations above, currency exchange can be further distinguished as spot, future, forward, non-delivery forward, swap and option.
A spot exchange is for currency exchange deals that are executed at the current rate, but the payments may take up to 2 days to complete. For example, for a typical USD/CAD exchange, 2 parties agree to trade at the current rate, which was 1.3 at 1pm on a Monday. The first payment from party A wired to party B at 3pm the same day, when the rate was 1.4. When party B received the payment from party A in the morning of the next day, which is a Tuesday, the rate changed to 1.2. At the time party B wired payment to party A on Tuesday afternoon the rate was 1.10. When party A finally received the payment, the rate was 1.0. All these changes during the 2 days for payment settlement after the deal does not matter.
The spot exchange accounts for 40% of total foreign exchange transactions. Trade amount of spot exchange was 2 trillion daily in 2019. The spot exchange is also the foundation of forward, future and options, as well as swap.
The future is a contract that states the currencies, the amount, the rate and the delivery time of the exchange. There are only 4 dates available for executing a future exchange contract, on the 3rd Wednesday of March, June, September, and December.
The rate of a future contract is calculated based on the spot rate adjusted by the differences of 2 currencies’ interest rates. For instance, the current rate for exchanging $10,000 currency from A to B is 1:1. Also, the annual interest rate for currency A is 0%, and currency B is 2%. Based on the information above, the future exchange rate for a 1 year contract should be 1.02:1. Holding $10,000 currency A for 1 year, the final amount is $10,000 ($10,000 + $0 interest). Holding currency B for a year, the final figure is $10,200 ($10,000 + $200 interest). To ensure the final amount of currency B at 1 year later is $10,200, a $200 extra markup for currency A is necessary. Otherwise no counter-party is willing to trade. That is why when the spot rate is 1, the future rate for 1 year contract is 1.02, based on the interest rate of 0% for currency A and 2% for currency B.
The future is tradable at a future exchange market between the date the contract was signed and the date of delivery. Only the party who holds the future exchange contract on the end date has the obligation to execute the contract.
The forward is a customized future exchange contract. The amount, the rate and the delivery date are all up to the 2 parties involved. Since a forward exchange contract is not a standard, it is not tradable at a future market.
The non-delivery forward is a special forward that no actual currencies actually exchanged. Instead, the difference of spot rates between the sign up and mature date will be calculated. The gain or loss based on this non-delivery forward will be settled between two parties involved.
For example, Party A would like to sign up a 3 months non-delivery forward that exchanges $10,000 currency A to B at a spot rate of 1. After 3 months, the spot rate becomes 1.2. Party A does not need to actually exchange currency A to B, but only pay the counter-party the difference of $2000, $10,000X(1.2-1).
The swap is two money changing transactions paired together. Same amount and rate, but the directions are opposite and execution dates are different. In other words, two parties agree to exchange certain amounts of currencies at a negotiated rate right now and exchange the currencies back at the same rate at a specified later date. This action is like party A borrowing a certain amount of currency B from party B and using currency A as collateral. Same ideal applies to party B too, borrowing currency A from party A and using currency B as collateral.
All these types of exchanges above distinguish each other, but they all have the same business logic behind the scene.
The most fundamental logic of money exchanging is that buying and selling rates are different. The difference between buy and sell generate financial gains that attract someone to act as counter-parties. Buying the currency customers want to sell and selling the currency customers want to buy, at the time of customers’ choices. Without the profits created by different rates, it is almost impossible to find counter-parties at the time of sale. The profits bring in professional dealers who buy the currency customers sell, at the time customers picked, and the amount customers decided. In addition, money exchangers have to hold the currency in stock, taking the risk of changing rates. Finally, money exchangers can only approximate when customers will show up; how much they will need and what the rates will be. The profit is the critical factor to connect the buy and sell transactions together over a period of time. Get the trade done immediately and efficiently. The way the money exchanging industry innovated is called market maker rule, which has evolved naturally over the past hundreds of years.
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