Currency-Adjusted Margin Calculator
Buy media in one currency and bill in another, and the margin you quoted is not the margin you keep. Enter both figures with the rate at booking, add the rate at settlement, and see exactly how much profit the exchange rate took — plus how far it can move before the deal stops making money.
In your billing currency.
In the currency you buy in.
Billing-currency units per cost-currency unit.
Leave blank to model no movement.
Enter revenue, media cost and the rate at booking to see the margin.
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Formula
Margin % = ((Revenue − (Cost × Rate)) ÷ Revenue) × 100 · Break-even Rate = Revenue ÷ CostRate is billing-currency units per cost-currency unit. Because revenue is fixed in its own currency, the entire effect of a rate movement falls on profit — which is why the FX impact figure is worth watching separately from the margin itself.
The movement lands entirely on profit
In a single-currency deal, margin is a buffer that absorbs small errors in either revenue or cost. Across currencies it does not work that way, because only one side moves. Revenue is contracted in your billing currency and stays put; the converted cost floats. A rate that moves four percent against you does not reduce your margin by four percent — it removes four percent of the cost base from your profit, which on a 23% margin is roughly a seventh of everything you were going to make. Traders who would never accept a 14% swing in media price accept the equivalent FX exposure without recording it anywhere.
Check the headroom before signing, not after
The useful number is not the margin but the distance to break-even: how far the rate can move before the deal earns nothing. A 20% margin in a stable pair over a two-week flight is comfortable. The same margin in a volatile pair over a six-month commitment is a position, not a cushion. Working the break-even rate out at the point of quoting costs nothing and occasionally changes the answer — either into a buffer built into the rate you offer, or into settling both sides in one currency and letting the counterparty carry it.
Frequently asked questions
- Why does a small rate move cost so much margin?
- Because the whole movement lands on profit. Revenue is fixed in your billing currency, so when the rate moves the converted cost changes and nothing offsets it. On a 23% margin, a 4% adverse move takes about 14% of the profit. The thinner the margin, the more violent the effect — at 5%, a 5% move wipes it out entirely.
- Which direction should I enter the rate?
- Billing-currency units per cost-currency unit. If you bill in EUR and buy in USD, a rate of 0.92 means one dollar of cost is 0.92 euros of cost. Entering it upside down produces a plausible-looking margin that is simply wrong, so sanity-check the converted cost figure before trusting the result.
- What is the break-even rate for?
- It is the rate at which the converted cost equals the revenue and the margin reaches zero. Knowing it before you sign tells you how much room the deal actually has — a comfortable-looking margin in a volatile pair over a long flight can be much closer to the edge than it appears.
- Should I hedge or price in a buffer?
- That is a finance decision rather than an ad ops one, but the number that informs it is the headroom shown here. If a deal cannot absorb a plausible move in the pair over its duration, the options are a buffer in the rate you quote, settlement in a single currency, or a shorter commitment. Ignoring it is the option that quietly loses money.