# $1US, US$1, $1.00USD, $USD1.00, etc. ?? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 7, 2003, 12:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1us-us-1-1-00usd-usd1-00-etc/173559 "2003-05-07T00:59:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![sisenor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6de8d8/32.png) [@sisenor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sisenor)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 12:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1us-us-1-1-00usd-usd1-00-etc/173559/1 "2003-05-07T00:59:34Z")
What is the correct/official way to denote currency of the United States? ---
**Author:** ![Q.E.D](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/51bf81/32.png) [@Q.E.D](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.E.D)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1us-us-1-1-00usd-usd1-00-etc/173559/2 "2003-05-07T01:15:08Z")
Either $1US or $1.00US is what I see most often used. ---
**Author:** ![Sublight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@Sublight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sublight)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 1:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1us-us-1-1-00usd-usd1-00-etc/173559/3 "2003-05-07T01:22:59Z")
I frequently see it written with the country/denomination first, such as USD1.00 or US$1.00 EUR0.98 JPY121 NZD1.97 or NZ$1.97 Basically, either way is pretty easy to understand, as long as your consistent. ---
**Author:** ![Sublight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@Sublight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sublight)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 1:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1us-us-1-1-00usd-usd1-00-etc/173559/4 "2003-05-07T01:24:42Z")
Of course, you may want to think twice about taking grammar or style advice from someone who can’t get your/you’re straight. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 1:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1us-us-1-1-00usd-usd1-00-etc/173559/5 "2003-05-07T01:24:50Z")
This is a matter of style, so there is no one official way of representing currency. The Chicago Manual of Style suggests: U.S. $2.47. For less formal writing I would condense it to: US$2.47. If this is for a college paper, then Turabian’s Manual or the MLA Style Manual or some other style specific to schools would need to be checked. ---
**Author:** ![Jervoise](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/d2c977/32.png) [@Jervoise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jervoise)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 1:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1us-us-1-1-00usd-usd1-00-etc/173559/6 "2003-05-07T01:38:46Z")
A common usage down here (in finance circles at least) is “USD 1.00”. “$US 1.00” is also widely used. “$USD” seems to be a tautology to me: I read it as “dollars US dollars”. ---
**Author:** ![KellyM](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/57b2e6/32.png) [@KellyM](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KellyM)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 3:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1us-us-1-1-00usd-usd1-00-etc/173559/7 "2003-05-07T03:12:44Z")
“USD” is a standard currency abbreviation (others include AUD, CAD, UKP, EUR, NOK, MXP, and DEM – the pattern should be obvious although EUR violates it, and I’ve seen EUE as an alternative). If you use USD, do not use the as it is redundant. US is used before the figure (as in US$1.00) when it is necessary to differentiate between US and Canadian (which can be abbreviated C$, CAN$, or CDN$) or Australian (A$, AU$, or AUS$) dollars (or any of a dozen other nations that also use a currency called the ‘dollar’). **Narrad** , the word you are looking for is “redundancy”. A “tautology” is a statement which is a priori true (such as “Either the car is red, or the car is not red.”) ---
**Author:** ![Jervoise](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/d2c977/32.png) [@Jervoise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jervoise)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 6:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1us-us-1-1-00usd-usd1-00-etc/173559/8 "2003-05-07T06:26:27Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by KellyM \* > \*\ ***Narrad** , the word you are looking for is “redundancy”. A “tautology” is a statement which is a priori true (such as “Either the car is red, or the car is not red.”) \*\* Where’s that smiley when I’m looking for it…? Ahh, here it is – :smack: ---
**Author:** ![Popup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/94ad74/32.png) [@Popup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Popup)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2003, 9:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/1us-us-1-1-00usd-usd1-00-etc/173559/9 "2003-05-07T09:56:05Z")
There is (as always) an international standard, called (in this case) [ISO-4217](http://www.instantaccess.co.uk/infozone/iso4217.htm). Basically it’s the two-letter country code (as assigned by ISO-3166) followed by a single character for the currency. This then precedes the amount. For example the Canadian currency should be called **CAD** , if you want to be standards compliant. (But then you would also use A4 paper , recognize that today is 2003-05-07 and use metric units - what I do, but maybe too much to hope for for the average 'merkin ;))