Re: [Debconf-team] [Debconf13-localteam] DC13 currency issues (renamed)
On 26/07/12 20:52, Gaudenz Steinlin wrote:
>
> Hi there
>
> Norman García Aguilar <norman@riseup.net> writes:
>
>> On Thu, 26 Jul 2012 11:21:03 +0200
>> Luca Capello <luca@pca.it> wrote:
>>
>>
>> Was it agreed to use CHF instead of EUR/USD? usually for DC in America
>> sposnorship brochure use USD and in Europe EUR...
>
> As Luca already said the CHF USD exchange rate is 1:1. So we can use the
> same amounts. I suggest that we have different versions of the brochure.
> For non european sponsors we use the USD amounts, for european non swiss
> sponsors EUR amounts converted with a 1:1.2 exchange rate and for swiss
> sponsors the CHF amounts. But I see this just as a technicality. The
Sadly, it is worse than that
Background - CHF
----------------
CHF climbed dramatically during 2010/2011. It was par with the EUR (1
EUR buys only 1 CHF) in mid-2011 and many big Swiss companies found that
they couldn't sell their products abroad because nobody could afford to
pay them. They threatened to close factories and sack people. The
Swiss central bank (SNB) pegged the CHF to the EUR, now 1 EUR buys 1.2
CHF at any time on any day, so it doesn't go up and down every day like
USD/EUR. Chart:
http://www.reuters.com/finance/currencies/quote?srcAmt=1.00&srcCurr=EUR&destAmt=&destCurr=CHF&historicalDate=
Notice the byte in the chart, August 2011? It is scary stuff.
Background - DebConf
--------------------
a) sponsors typically pay in the last few weeks before DebConf
b) sponsors not always local
c) small sponsors may prefer to commit in their own currency (e.g EUR or
GBP) and US sponsors may feel they can just pay USD
d) biggest expenses are in CHF
Possible scenarios
------------------
a) everything stays as it is today and our calculations are easy
b) some small countries break away from the Eurozone and the EUR/CHF =
1.2 peg stays intact, so calculations don't change
c) bigger break up of Eurozone (e.g. Spain) or some other crisis - in
this case, the EUR/CHF = 1.2 `peg' may not work, CHF could go up, like
in August 2011
A bit more background: when the SNB made the peg, they gave no advance
warning. They just did it. In fact, most of these economic things go
that way: the day Lehman Brothers collapsed, it `just happened'. If
Greece leaves the Euro, don't expect to get 30 days notice.
Key point: If there is another change in the CHF, nobody is going to
give us advance warning. We just have to be prepared for the worst.
Ideas to explore
----------------
a) Must collect money early, not just 1 month before DebConf, and
convert to CHF immediately
b) negotiate with venue - see if they will agree to a contract in Euro
(some employment contracts are already denominated in Euro). Some Swiss
companies do accept Euro.
c) all sponsors must agree to pay in CHF - but will small/medium
companies agree to this? Some companies will feel that we are asking
them to take the FX risk. So give them the choice: pay today in EUR or
USD, or if they want to pay at the last minute, their sponsorship
contract/pledge will be in CHF.
d) as suggested in my other email, ask participants to put up some money
to build a safety net, underwriting the event: we would need a proper
legal structure to protect everybody's money though
e) set a deadline for getting signed sponsorship pledges, and tell
people not to buy plane tickets until DebConf hits the sponsorship target
I think DebConf can work out some combination of these things - there
will only be problems if there is no plan for currency risk
Reply to: