Technical article

What a Moving Exchange Rate Does to Your Monthly Spending

It is what happens to US$3,000 when the exchange rate moves.

By Neil Solomon · 5 min read

Picture a couple named Dale and Marian. Both are 66. They receive US$3,000 a month from a pension and Social Security. They are comparing Lisbon, Lyon, Leipzig and Budapest. Their rent and groceries will be paid in local money. Their income will not. So the first question is not which country costs less. It is what happens to US$3,000 when the exchange rate moves.

One currency for three of the four countries

France, Germany and Portugal all use the euro. Hungary uses the forint (HUF). That means two rates matter: euros per US dollar, and forints per euro.

The European Central Bank publishes a daily reference rate. It says the rates are "published for information purposes only" and that "using the rates for transaction purposes is strongly discouraged." So they show where the market stood. They are not the rate a bank or transfer service will give.

On 9 October 2026 the European Central Bank rate was EUR 1 = US$1.1206.

What the euro did against the dollar

Looking at each day from January 2022 to 9 October 2026, the lowest rate was 0.9565 on 28 September 2022, just under parity. The highest was 1.1974 on 28 January 2026. (I took the low and high from the daily series on the European Central Bank's data portal.)

Here is what that range did to Dale and Marian. All figures below are my arithmetic.

The same pension bought about EUR 630 more a month at the low than at the high. Turned around, a fixed bill of EUR 3,000 a month cost US$2,870 at the low, US$3,362 on 9 October and US$3,592 at the high.

For someone paid in dollars and spending in euros, a stronger euro means a higher bill. For someone who holds euros, the same move helps. Both can happen in the same year.

Hungary: a second layer

In Hungary the spending is in forints. A dollar pension meets the forint directly, and the euro rate also gives a guide.

The Hungarian central bank (Magyar Nemzeti Bank) listed these official rates for 9 October 2026: EUR 1 = HUF 364.82, and US$1 = HUF 325.21. On the same day the European Central Bank listed EUR 1 = HUF 365.08. The two official pages differ by a small amount. I show both and do not pick.

By my arithmetic, US$3,000 at the Hungarian central bank rate is about HUF 975,630.

From January 2022 to 9 October 2026 the forint was weakest at HUF 430.65 per euro (13 October 2022) and strongest at HUF 349.53 (16 June 2026). Take a monthly bill of HUF 600,000. At the weak rate it is EUR 1,393. At the strong rate it is EUR 1,717. At the 9 October rate it is EUR 1,643. All of that is my arithmetic.

A weaker forint means a forint bill costs fewer euros or dollars. Prices in forints also change over time, and they are not set beside the rate here.

France, Germany and Portugal compared

The three euro countries share one rate. A US$3,000 income moves by the same percentage in Lisbon, Lyon and Leipzig. What differs is the monthly spending in each, which is a separate question and not covered here.

What the European Union rule says about charges

The EU regulation on cross-border payments (Regulation (EU) 2021/1230) has two parts that matter here. Article 3 says charges for euro cross-border payments "shall be the same as the charges levied by that payment service provider for corresponding national payments." Article 3(4) says that does not apply to currency conversion charges. So a euro transfer between euro countries should cost the same as a local one, but a conversion from dollars is outside that rule.

Article 4 covers card payments with a currency conversion. The provider must "express the total currency conversion charges as a percentage mark-up" over the latest European Central Bank euro reference rate, and disclose it before the payment starts (paraphrase of the page summary I read). The regulation's scope for particular providers and transfer types is set in its own text, so check it for the transfer service you would use.

What is left open

• Future rates. No official page predicts them, so the tables above show the past range only.
• Rules for sending a pension into any of the four countries. The sending side is the pension payer's rule (for Social Security, the direct deposit agreement list), and the receiving bank's terms decide the rate and fee, so ask both before you move.