Exchange rates in excel

With Office 365, you can insert Exchange rate in your worksheets

The version of Excel in Office 365 allows you to collect the exchange rate of currencies of the current day.

Add Exchange Rate

The Office 365 version provides a great new feature ; Data Type. You just have to fill geographic data or financial data and Excel connects to a database to add values to the original one.

If you want to add financial data to the name of a stock holder or to return the exchange rate between 2 currencies, you just have to write your value in cells and then Click on the button Data > Stocks. You can use any separator ; space, dash, slash, pipe, …

What are the details behind the link

Once your have linked 2 currency to the Data Type tool, you can visualized all the informations in relationship between the 2 currencies by clicking on the icon

As you can see, behind a single connection between 2 currencies, you can return a lot of informations.

Return the last Exchange rate

What is amazing with Data Type, it’s the simplicity to return one of the data linked. To do that, you can click on the little rectangle in order to open the list of data you can add.

Or you can write a formula with a reference to the cell with the icon and then you press dot. Like that, you can also visualise all the information linked. Double-click or press Tab to select the option you want.

In both situation, the formula is

=D2.Price

Copy the dotted formula (beware of the format)

Like all the formulas in Excel, you can easily drag-and-drop the fill-handle to copy the formula.

But in this situation, you must take care of the currency format. Of course, when you copy the formula, you copy also the format of the original cell.

But you can force the each format by selecting the option Update Format.

Here’s a ‘no fuss, no muss’ way to grab the latest exchange rates and use them in Excel.  No need to lookup a rate and type it in, let Excel do all that work for you.

You might expect Excel to do this out of the box.  After all, Microsoft has been banging on about Internet integration for years and their main rival, Google, has an exchange rate function in their spreadsheets (see GoogleFinance() ).

Real Time Excel

Real-Time Excel – get live stock, fund and bond prices, currency rates and more includes working spreadsheets for this tip and many other examples of getting live information into Excel. Buy and get it today (just a few minutes from now)

Tip: If you have Excel 365 there’s a much easier way see Exchange Rate support in Excel 365

There are many places on the web which supply exchange rate information in a computer readable format.  Excel can grab that data and put it into cells for the worksheet.   For this article, we set some limitations:

• No VBA code or addons. This removes security concerns or hassles.  Our example uses a simple .xlsx worksheet.
• Simple system that’s easy to explore and understand.
• Free access to the exchange rate information
• Xrates in XML format (which Excel understands).

Microsoft once provided a connection to their MSN data source but that’s been dropped.

For our examples, we’ll use data from FloatRates.com because their XML data format is simple and uncomplicated compared to others.  The web link is simple, needs no changing parameters and no registration.

For the latest US Dollar exchange rates go to http://www.floatrates.com/daily/usd.xml this is an XML data feed which looks like a web page via a XML style sheet.  Choose ‘View Source’ in your browser to see the underlying data which is what Excel will copy into a worksheet.

FloatRates.com web page (left) and source page as XML (right)

FloatRates.com also has exchange rates with other currencies as a base.

Canada: http://www.floatrates.com/daily/cad.xml

UK: http://www.floatrates.com/daily/gbp.xml

Euro: http://www.floatrates.com/daily/eur.xml

Australia: http://www.floatrates.com/daily/aud.xml

New Zealand: http://www.floatrates.com/daily/nzd.xml

For the full list go to http://www.floatrates.com/feeds.html

Data Connection

The standard recommendation for web data importing is Data | Get External Data | From Web which works for web pages with tables (the <TABLE> tag) but that doesn’t work if the XML data is changed with a style sheet.

So, we dig a little deeper to Get External Data | From Other Sources | From XML data import.  This tells Excel to ignore the style sheet formatting and use the XML data only.

Paste the web link (complete with http:// or preferably https:// prefix) in the Select Data Source dialog. See above for a list of options.

Excel will warn if there’s no XML schema available, that’s OK, let Excel create one for you.  An XML schema is the structure of the XML data feed which, officially, should always be supplied.  In practice, many XML feeds don’t have a schema because it’s obvious from the feed itself.

Next, tell Excel where to put the data, most likely a New worksheet.

Before clicking OK, check out the Properties.

Name: make sure the Query name is self-explanatory

Refresh Control:  Make the refresh rate suitable to the data feed. In this case the data is only updated every 12 hours, so there’s no point in refreshing every hour (the default).

Now there’s a worksheet with 92 current conversions from US Dollar to international currencies in your worksheet.

Use Vlookup() to grab the exchange rate you want for your calculation.

Note: Vlookup requires the source data to be sorted on the column you’ll be using for the lookup.  Do that from the Data | Sort tab.

You have to re-sort the list after each time the data is refreshed.  Real-Time Excel – get live stock prices, currency rates and more shows how to get around that Excel limitation.

Check your calculation!

It’s too easy to get an exchange rate ‘turned around’.   Even experts can get the Buy and Sell rates for a currency confused.  Here’s a snippet of the ‘USD dollar’ rate feed.

These rates apply if you have US dollars and what you’ll get if you buy the other currency.  For example, if you have USD$1 you’ll get  0.89 Euro,  77 UK pence or $1.311 Aussie dollars.

The common mistake is the multiply the rate given when you want to buy (convert into) the base currency.  That’s wrong and will give you very misleading answers.

Reverse xrate: if you want to convert from other currencies to the base currency (US dollars in this case) divide the rate into 1. ( = 1/rate ).  Do that by making a ‘parallel’ column that converts the rate.

Now you can convert from and to the base currency. Just make sure you choose the correct column/rate!

Double check: check your worksheet logic by doing tests against one of the many currency conversion web sites.

That’s just the basics of online data import into Excel for currency conversions.   Real-Time Excel – get live stock prices, currency rates and more has useful extra info you should get with the currency data.  Also, other online data that Excel can grab.

Excel Price Feed is ideal for populating your Excel spreadsheet with live currency exchange rates.

Introduction

If you run an international business that deals in a variety of currencies or are simply trying to work out how much you spent on holiday then you have no doubt spent time updating a spreadsheet with the latest exchange rates.

This usually means looking up the rate on a website then copying/pasting the rate into a cell in your sheet. This process is repeated for each currency, and is repeated again whenever you want to update the fx rates (the fx market is open 24 hours a day).

There is an easier way, you can use the Excel Price Feed Add-in to automatically retrieve live exchange rates into Excel cells.

You set up the formula once and then each time you refresh your spreadsheet the latest live exchange rates are retrieved and the rate in the cell is updated.

Live Exchange Rates Example

After installing the Add-in you now have access to 100+ new Excel formulas, including the one below which will retrieve the live Euro / US Dollar (EUR/USD) exchange rate from Yahoo Finance:

=EPF.Yahoo.Price("EURUSD=X")

This formula uses currency code of the exchange rate you require, the convention for Yahoo Finance is the currency pair code followed by «=X».

If you don’t know the currency code then you can use the search screen on the Configuration Pane, accessed from the button on the toolbar.

For this example we will start with a table of widgets that we are sourcing from 3 different countries which are priced in 3 different currencies:

To populate the USD price column we just need to provide the live exchange rate to the «Rate» column, for example here we can see the EPF.Yahoo.Price formula used for the Euro widget in the Rate cell:

We repeat this formula for the next two rows, we now have the dollar price for each widget and can calculate a dollar total for all 3 widgets:

Any time you wish to update the exchange rates, simply press the «Refresh Sheet» button on the Excel Price Feed toolbar, no more copying/pasting exchange rates!

Historic Exchange Rates

Excel Price Feed also provides the ability to retrieve historic exchange rates into Excel cells. This is achieved using the EPF.Yahoo.Historic.Close formula.

For example, this formula will retrieve the Euro/US Dollar (EURUSD) exchange rate as it was on 1 January 2019:

=EPF.Yahoo.Historic.Close("EURUSD=X","1 Jan 2019")

Summary

We hope this tutorial really helps you save time building Excel spreadsheets that need live currency exchange rates.

Discover the power of Excel Price Feed with 80+ new Excel formulas for live, historic and fundamental data in your spreadsheet. Click the button below to request an Activation Code for your free 10 day trial:

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In this example, the goal is to get monthly currency exchange rates for a given currency pair (i.e. USD > EUR, USD > GBP, CAD > JPY, etc.). Currency abbreviations are entered in cells F5 and F6, and the start and end dates are entered in cells F7 and F8. If any of these four inputs are changed, the results seen in columns B and C will update dynamically. This can be done with the STOCKHISTORY function, whose purpose is to retrieve historical information for a financial instrument over time.

Overview

Although the name suggests otherwise, the STOCKHISTORY function can work with a variety of financial instruments, including bonds, index funds, mutual funds, bonds, and currency pairs. To work with currency exchange rates, STOCKHISTORY requires a currency pair entered as text.

STOCKHISTORY takes up to 11 arguments, most of which are optional. The syntax for the first 4 arguments looks like this:

=STOCKHISTORY(stock,start_date,[end_date],[interval])

Stock is a unique key for the instrument being retrieved, entered as a text value. For currency exchange rates, stock will be a currency pair like «USD:CAD». Start_date and end_date are Excel dates that define the time period being requested. Interval is the time interval – daily, weekly, or monthly. For a more complete description of all arguments and properties, see our STOCKHISTORY function page.

Basic currency exchange example

To get exchange rates for a given currency pair with STOCKHISTORY, enter the two 3-letter codes separated by a colon (:) as the stock argument. For example, to get the currency exchange rate between the US Dollar («USD») and the Euro («EUR») for the months of January 2021 through March 2021, you can use STOCKHISTORY like this:

=STOCKHISTORY("USD:EUR","1-Jan-2021","1-Mar-2021",2)

In this example, the stock argument is the text value «USD:EUR», start_date is «1-Jan-2021», end_date is «1-Mar-2021». The interval argument specifies the time period to use between prices. The options are daily (0), weekly (1), or monthly (2). In this case, we want a monthly interval, so we provide 2. The result is an array with three months of rates:

To reverse the direction of the exchange, just swap the order of the currency pairs:

=STOCKHISTORY("EUR:USD","1-Jan-2021","1-Mar-2021",2)

Returns exchange rates in the opposite direction:

Note: in general, it’s safer to use the DATE function to enter dates in other formulas because it eliminates the risk of a text value being misinterpreted on other systems with different locale settings, but in this case dates are entered as text to keep things simple.

Connecting the input cells

To connect the basic formula above with the input cells in the example, shown, we need to substitute cell references for the hardcoded values. The final formula in cell B4 is:

=STOCKHISTORY(F5&":"&F6,F7,F8,2)

Notice we assemble the stock argument by concatenating the currency symbols in cells F5 and F6 together, separated by a colon:

F5&":"&F6 // returns ""USD:EUR"

The result is fully dynamic. If any of these four inputs are changed, STOCKHISTORY will immediately return a new set of exchange rates. In the screen below, currency 1 has been set to «USD» (US Dollar) and currency 2 has been set to «JPY» (Japanese Yen):

The STOCKHISTORY function automatically sets the currency symbol as needed.

Note: when interval is set to monthly (2) as in this example, the STOCKHISTORY function will return the last available exchange rate in a given month.

You can use Microsoft Excel not only to create regular spreadsheets. There is a way to make your currency converter. In other words, you can make your currency exchange rates if you need to show some financial data report, for example. A special Currencies function is used for this purpose in Microsoft Excel.

You can get the time of the last trade, highs and lows, percent change, and more by entering a couple of ISO currency codes. Then simply select the details you want to include and update the data as needed.

You should also know that the Currencies option is only available now to Microsoft 365 subscribers. Well, there’s nothing complicated about getting currency exchange rates in Microsoft Excel. Here’s how you can do it.

How to use the Currencies option to calculate exchange rates in Microsoft Excel

With the Currencies option, you can easily obtain and compare currency rates from around the world. So, follow these steps:

• First of all, enter a currency pair in the cell using this format: From Currency / To Currency with ISO currency codes. For example, enter “USD/EUR” to get the exchange rate of one U.S. dollar to one euro.
• Then highlight the cells and click “Insert”.
• Select “Table” from the list. Although creating a table is optional, it will make it much easier to insert data from the data type later on.
• After that, go to the “Data” tab and select the “Currencies” data type.

If the program finds a match between the currency pair and the data provider, your text will be converted to the data type and the Currencies icon for the stock will appear in the cell.

If you see a question mark instead of a Currencies icon in a cell, Excel is having trouble matching text to data. Fix any errors and press Enter to try again. Alternatively, select the icon to open the Data Selector, where you can find the currency pair or specify the data you want.

Next, you need to:

• Select one or more converted cells and choose the Insert Data button that appears, or press Ctrl/Cmd + Shift + F5.
• You will see a list of all available fields to select from. Choose the fields to add a new data column.

Now, you can use it in formulas or calculations. To make sure your data is up to date, you can click “Data” and select “Refresh All” to get an updated quote. If you want to update only one pair you can select it and click “Refresh”.

How to convert currencies in Microsoft Excel

There is a way to convert currencies in Microsoft Excel without using a currency converter. To do this, you only need to use one formula.

To convert one currency to another, you must use 3 columns on the Excel sheet. The first column is for the target currency, the second is for the exchange rate, and the third is for the converted currency.

The formulas look like this: [Location of the first cell]*$[Column for exchange rate]$[Row for exchange rate]

Where [Location of the first cell] is the location of the first cell in the column of cells with the monetary values of the target currency. [Column for exchange rate] and [Row for exchange rate] are the column letter and row numbers for the cell in which the exchange rate is mentioned.

Essentially, this formula is designed to simply multiply the target currency by the exchange rate.

Read Also:

• How to add today’s date in Microsoft Excel
• How to switch the X and Y-axis in Microsoft Excel
• How to build a bubble chart in Microsoft Excel

How to calculate the exchange rate between two currencies in Microsoft Excel

Finding an exchange rate between two currencies is easy. Open Google and simply type in the abbreviations of the two currencies you want to compare. It will automatically display the exchange rate per unit of the first currency.

Suppose you have a column of values in dollars with values located from cell A2 to A6. You need the corresponding values in euros in column C, starting in cells C2 through C6.

• Write the exchange rate in cell B2.
• Now write the formula = A2*$B$2 in cell C2 and press Enter.
• Click anywhere outside of cell C2 and then again on cell C2 to highlight the Fill button.
• Pull down cell C2 to cell C6, and it will display all the euro values in sequence.

Adding a unit of currency is one of the difficulties of this method. Nevertheless, it’s better than buying a special tool specifically for this.