[OSGeo Finance] Impact of the recent fall in the rand?

[Frank Warmerdam]

jo at frot.org wrote:
> dear all,
> 
> A question about the receipts from FOSS4G 2008.
> 
> The South African rand has lost a lot of value against the dollar recently.
> http://www.x-rates.com/d/USD/ZAR/graph120.html

Jo,

Wow, that is a pretty dramatic drop off!

> I recall the agreement was that any profits would be split three ways 
> between OSGeo, GISSA and GISSA's educational initiative. If OSGeo's 
> share is significant enough, it is perhaps worth keeping it in SA until 
> the rates recover a bit.

Final accounting is not complete yet as far as I know, but my understanding
is that the expected profit will be quite modest when split three ways so
I don't foresee much point in trying to hold it in rand.

On the point of currency fluctuations, I am more concerned about our
USD/CAD exposure.  The CAD has dropped 20% against the USD in the last
few months which should noticably reduce our salary costs for Tyler (not the
CAD is back roughly where it was when we hired Tyler), but in general we
are exposed to significant variability due to currency changes between
the US (all our accounting is in USD) and Canada (our largest expense is
in CAD).

I'm also not possitive if our TD bank account is in USD or CAD.  Tyler can
you confirm which it is?

Best regards,
-- 
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I set the clouds in motion - turn up   | Frank Warmerdam, warmerdam at pobox.com
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and watch the world go round - Rush    | Geospatial Programmer for Rent