Currency Impact on Returns

Reading the history…

How the two combine

Rebased to 100

Reading the history…

Why the headline number is not your number

An index is quoted in its home currency, so “the S&P 500 returned 254%” is a statement about dollars. Hold it from outside the dollar and you also hold a currency position you did not choose, settled on the day you sell. The S&P 500 is quoted in USD; where that differs from yours, every daily close here is converted at the ECB fixing on or before its own date — never a later one.

The cross term is why you cannot just add. converted = native + fx + native × fx. On a large return a small currency move is not small: a −3% currency against a +254% index costs about 11 points, not 3, because the currency applies to the gains too.

This is a return on an index level, not on a fund. It excludes dividends, fees and any hedging — a currency-hedged fund exists precisely to remove the line this page measures, and pays a cost for it. It also excludes what you paid to move the money in the first place, which the exchange fee calculator measures. To look up the rate on a single date use the currency converter, and for where these rates come from, the currency board.

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