Skip to main content

International Currency Conversion

United States (U.S.) currency is formatted with a decimal point (.) as a separator between the dollars and cents. Some countries use a comma (,) instead of a decimal to indicate that separation. In addition, while the U.S. and a number of other countries use a comma to separate thousands, some countries use a decimal point for this purpose.

For these reasons, it’s critically important to recognize the differences in the placement of decimal points and commas in international currency. Failure to do so could result in the loss of significant amounts of money for Cornell.

To help staff members identify the formatting for currency, below is a list of countries and their respective currency formats. It is also important to note that most currencies utilize the format of threes and twos for dollars and cents (see the examples below), which means that the decimal or comma should be irrelevant, especially when the cents are shown. This is what staff members should look for when converting currencies.


  • 500 or 500,00 or 500.00 = five hundred dollars and no cents
  • 500,15  or 500.15 = five hundred dollars and fifteen cents
  • 500,150 or 500.150 or 500,150.00 or 500.150,00 = five hundred thousand, one hundred fifty dollars and no cents