I just found out today that because I’m also a customer of my bank’s investment banking outfit, it entitles me to a better USD-CAD exchange rate than regular customers!  I forgot to ask just how much the benefit was, but I am pleasantly surprised since this is the second time in about a week that my bank has bent over to help me out, and it’s all because I’m becoming a “better customer.”

So if you’re Canadian, consider becoming a customer of your own bank’s investment service.*  If you bank at the Bank of Montreal, sign up with BMO Investorline.  If you’re at Scotia, enrol with Scotia McLeod Direct Investing and link it to your online account.  It can pay off in the long run.  This preferred exchange rate was never advertised at my own bank - as far as I’m aware - the teller just mentioned it now because “I’m a good customer.”

How to be a better customer?  (1) Keep your account open: don’t close it and keep switching banks.  If you want an account with another bank, open one, but keep your previous one active too.  The longer you have an account with your bank, the better your relationship with the bank will be.  (2) Try to keep as many of your products as possible at the same bank.  Money market fund, Foreign exchange account, savings accounts, credit line, credit cards, etc.  Same principle as above.  Have several at several banks if you need to.

*If you’re American, as I understand it most banks or “savings and loans” vehicles don’t also have their own investment bank associated with them.  So I’m not sure how this would work.  You should still look into how you can get preferential exchange rate treatment if you’re a great customer, however.

Canadian or American, the dollars are pretty much as equal as they can be today. It’s a good day to go in to your local currency exchange and pick up on the holiday dollars you need for vacationing, conferences, business, or whenever else you need to do anything across the border.

For Americans, who knows how much higher the loonie will go? In all fairness, at least based on historical performance, it doesn’t seem likely it will go higher than $1.10, but that number’s been bandied around lately by our Finance Minister as looking likely.

For Canadians, it’s an even bigger draw. This is the time to load up on your greenbacks while you don’t lose any money.

I’m not a forex trader, in fact, I know little about professional forex trading at this point - although I’m going to learn it - but for just very practical purposes, this is a good time to continue your cross-border purchases. Prices is either country can be compared most easily, now, too.

Do you have Canadian or American investments? Might want to make extra deposits or purchases now. In any case, it’s a good time to review how they’re doing. It is not often that we see dollar parity as we did earlier today. One good service for comparing currencies is Oanda. You can see that the dollars have already shifted a bit, but keep paying attention. (And what is a thousandth of a dollar, anyways? I wouldn’t personally worry about the fourth decimal place).

Also see the Financial Post story, “Canadian Dollar Hits Parity While Greenback Falls to Record Low.”

Here’s one of Jim Rogers’ latest interviews with Bloomberg (June 5, 2008). I always smile at these. He seems so annoyed and frustrated at talking with journalists and reporters. It’s as though he feels that it’s all so common sense - of course you should know that bankruptcies are signs of bottoms and that means it’s a good time to be buying into the airline industry!:) Betty gets him riled up about all the usual suspects: the Fed, Bernanke, the banks, what he’s shorting, commodities, food, gold, Soros, oil and more commodities.

“If People are Talking About a Bubble, I’d Like to Know What They’re Talking About… Sugar’s down 80% from its All-time High - What Kind of Bubble is that?”

I’m actually surprised that he does go into so much detail on all the stocks he owns and what he’s short and how much etc. on national broadcast. Betty even asks him if he’s short on Lehman Brothers. Turns out he’s short all of them through his investment bank ETF.