[bencoder]

This can be done but I believe it is a bit more expensive than via banks, since you have exchange fees and the spread as liquidity isn't quite high enough (assuming you want to transfer ASAP. If you are willing to wait on both sides you can do a lot better)

Example exchanging 500 GBP to EUR (via intersango at current rates):

Buy 104.6 BTC @ 4.76GBP Fees for instant trade: 0.95% = ~1 BTC. Balance: 103.6BTC

Sell 103.6BTC @ 5.8EUR = 600.88 eur Fees for instant trade: 0.95% = ~5.71. Balance: 595.17EUR

500 GBP went to 595.17EUR. Exchange rate: 1.19. (google tells me the exchange rate is about 1.26 at the moment, so this is quite poor)

[repsilat]

You're right, that's not good. I imagine it would get better if people started doing things like that in higher volumes, but that's a bit of a Catch 22.

Until then, there are a couple of mitigating factors:

- You may not get the market rate from anyone. The UK post office is only giving me a rate of 1.2260 to the Euro.

- If you need to pay a fee for a transfer it could be worthwhile for small amounts. The UK post office doesn't charge a fee, but it has a min transfer of £250. www.tranzfers.com charges £7 or $15AU. I've paid more elsewhere.

[pessimizer]

I've seen a lot worse at the airport. Assuming that people are using bitcoin for reasons other than a favorable exchange rate, 7 points isn't going to be a deal killer, or even a deal slower.