Dinar Trade: Good idea?
The dinar is the unit of currency, not only in Iraq, but in eight other Arab countries: Algeria, Bahrain, Jordan, Kuwait, Libya, Macedonia, Serbia, and Tunisia all issue dinars. Five other countries— Sudan, the United Arab Emirates, Yemen, and the former Yugoslav republics other than those mentioned above— once used the dinar, but have since adopted other currency. (When Yugoslavia was intact, it too used the dinar; and newly independent South Sudan uses the South Sudanese pound.) So there are some dinar trade options out there other than just Iraq.
Dinar Trade: History
There is an interesting history behind this monetary unit. The name comes from that of a Roman coin called the denarius, meaning “ten count,” because its value was weighed at ten donkeys. When the Eastern Roman Empire arose, it began minting denarii, and passed it on to the Arabs. In 774 the Mercian King Offa coined a series of dinars issued by the Abbasid caliphate, possibly so he could trade with Arab Spain; but there are many errors in the Arabic writing on these coins. Even back then dinar trade was risky.
Dinar Trade: Recent History
No Iraqi dinar coins have been minted since 1990, except for a brief period in 2004, when new coins were issued but proved unpopular. But that same year, a company called Dinar Trade registered with the U. S. Department of the Treasury. Since then, many people have made money buying and selling coin and paper dinars. And the U. S. government encourages such economic activity as essential to helping to build the economy of a country wrecked by twenty- five years of Saddam’s tyranny: President Obama has issued Order 39, which gives citizens of the United States equal investing rights as Iraqis in that country.
Trade in the Iraqi dinar does sound like a wise monetary investment: The value of the currency has increased since 2004— or has it? It turns out that sales pitches conceal the actual facts, by not taking into account the tremendous inflation that has taken place in Iraq in the intervening years. The actual difference between the dollar- to- dinar exchange rates of 2004 and 2011 comes out to less than one cent! And unfortunately, Dinar Trade has announced that they are withdrawing temporarily from the market and will neither buy nor sell now, until the dinar changes significantly in value. Inflation has also rendered the fils— defined as one thousandth of a dinar (this is unusual; most currencies are divided into hundredths)— obsolete.
Dinar Trade: Concerns
There are other problems, too: Iraq has yet to expand economically. Also, many people also make counterfeit dinars and try to sell them as genuine. But you can learn to spot fakes by comparing what you buy with the pictures of each denomination on display at iraqidinar.org. It’s wise to study these before entering into Dinar trade.
In the end, I would say that if you are thinking about investing your money in dinar trade, you should carefully reconsider whether you it is really worth making such a potentially risky investment. You would probably be much better off investing in the domestic stock market, or in U. S. Treasury bonds. Dinar trade could one day be a very profitable option, but there are so many questions and issues in the air at this time, that it’s deemed to be a risky proposition.