If you’re moving to Canada, perché è importante prestare attenzione ai cambiamenti del tasso di cambio tra U.S. dollari canadesi e?

Perché a seconda del modo in cui le valute si muovono, it can cost you big bucks.

Here’s what happened to the city of Vancouver.

As reported in today’s Vancouver Sun under the headline, “Exchange risk could cost city $60 milioni di euro: Prestito per il Villaggio Olimpico deve essere restituito in U.S. dollars bought when the loonie was aloft,” the city has gotten into trouble over the financing of the new Villaggio Olimpico:

Just when you thought you’ve computed all the risks from the Olympic village crisis, here’s another. The $1.2-billion development has been financed using international “currency swaps,” one of the riskiest ways to borrow.

Here’s the situation.

The builder of the Olympic village, Vancouver’s Sviluppo del Millennio, arranged to borrow its construction budget for the Olympic Athletes’ Village from Wall Street’s Fortress Investment Group. That $750-million line of credit was to be borrowed in U.S. dollars, poi convertiti in matti, di pagare gli appaltatori.

That probably seemed swell at the time. Our loonie was flying high back then. For a period it was even at par, o sopra la U.S. greenback, and seemed destined to float there. Stati Uniti. dollars actually seemed cheap.

Intorno poi, sappiamo Millennium iniziato a disegnare calo di circa $300 million of that $750 million Fortress loan, though exact dates of when money was drawn aren’t public. But supposing Millennium made its draw when the loonie was at par, circa. Millennium would have roughly gotten a one-to-one deal on its loan. Questo è: $1 Canadian = $1 US.

Non male. How can you go wrong with a deal like that?

Bene, quite easily when world currency currents turn against you.

Foto di Payton Chung (flickr)