What does =R do in {base}{quote}=R and why are many currency pairs unknown without it

Hello I have started checking out the data retrieved from RetrieveItem_Request_3 quote. Originally I could only get the rates between very few currency pairs but I saw someone else use =R and tried it out and I could suddenly get rates between all currency pairs. I have however come across some inconsistent values when getting the rates. There is for example a different result between using {curr}= and {curr}=R. Hence part of my question is why this is but also what R actually does and why only some pairs has rates without it. As an aside there are also some results that seem to have been multiplied before being returned which must be a bug. For example CHFDKK=R gives 6.2 CF_LAST while DKKCHF=R gvies 16.1. These numbers multiplied should give 1 but gives 100 instead.

Best Answer

  • You can find the explanation for the difference between {curr=} and {curr=R} in this thread. Read both of my posts on that thread for complete answer.
    For many currency pairs active interbank market does not exist and hence no {curr=} RIC is provided. When an active market exists for a currency pair there's typically a market convention to quote the currency pair that picks one currency as the base and the other as quoted, but not the other way around. E.g. GBPCHF is conventionally quoted with GBP being the base, hence GBPCHF= RIC exists while CHFGBP= does not. {curr=R} RICs are calculated by Thomson Reuters for all currency pairs and all base/quoted combinations.
    Some currency pairs are quoted with a scaling factor by market convention. E.g. Polish Zloty against Japanese Yen is quoted in zloty per 100 yen, not per 1 yen. You can find the scaling factor for the currency pair in field named SCALING (FID number 3754). In RICs JPYPLN= (and in DKKCHF=R which you used) the value of the SCALING field is 100.

Answers

  • Thanks for the swift reply. I was busy doing some other work and forgot to answer here. Cheers:)