Re: i can't afford new toys anymore
Yeah with the OZ dollar you have a different problem - the government keeps lowering interest rates because, again, commodities are falling and inflation isn't the problem that it was last year. So in that situation it is quite possible that the OZ dollar was significantly overvalued for a period of time (since people were in it mainly for the nice returns), and that once it was no longer attractive to investors, they bolted. But the AUD is a relatively minor currency on the world scale, which may be the reason investors and (possibly) speculators have been able to send it tumbling so violently so quickly. Same thing with the NZD over the last year.
But it should be noted that the fall of the AUD started before the government started lowering rates. So I think there's more at work there than just the interest rate issue. Unless of course it was the speculation of impending lowered rates that triggered some of the sell off.
In terms of the three major currencies, no investor or speculator (besides a country's central bank) is strong enough to move any of them, so when they rise or fall, it's because of global perceptions/trends and mass migrations of capital.
I guess it's a pretty nice time for some of the FX wonks to play the field, with all these wild swings. But there's also huge downside risk. You need balls of steel in this market.
