What is the ruling on trading in currency?

The questioner : We know in this era the process of exchanging currency...?

The Shaykh : Personally, I do not see trading in this type of trade as permissible.
The student : Praise be to Allah.

The Shaykh : May Allah have mercy on you. That is because it is known to all people that these paper currencies do not have intrinsic value like the two metals, gold and silver, nor do the other metals have intrinsic value. As for paper currency, it has no intrinsic value. I mean by this that this currency is a piece of paper, originally white, upon which writing is inscribed and printed. Due to this writing, it has acquired a nominal value, not an intrinsic value. For example, a dinar note might be slightly larger, by ten, or other currencies might be slightly larger, by a hundred. Did this difference in value come from the value of the paper because it is large or small? Of course not. It was known in the past that the value of these paper currencies was based on the amount of gold allocated to each note. So, if we assume, for example, that the Jordanian dinar corresponds to 5 grams of gold—I do not know what the reality is, but for example—if you buy another currency with this currency, and that other currency has intrinsic value, meaning a gold reserve of 6 grams instead of 5 grams, then it is not permissible in this case to buy one dinar with another dinar, where one has a lower intrinsic value than the other. In other words, I am addressing the current reality. We know that the Iraqi dinar was previously more expensive than the Jordanian dinar. Now its value is one-third of the Jordanian dinar. What happened? Did the intrinsic value, which is the reserve of the Iraqi dinar, drop until we buy three Iraqi dinars for one Jordanian dinar? Likewise, the Lebanese and Syrian pounds, and so on. So, there are political factors that intervene to raise the value of some paper currencies or lower it according to the interests of powerful countries. For example, the dollar you mentioned, what raises its value and what lowers it? Does it have intrinsic value? No, not at all. Rather, there are policies from major countries to weaken other countries due to this lowering and raising. Therefore, I see that exchanging these currencies is not permissible except within the limits of dire necessity. And I see that the interest of the Muslims is that they have in their hands gold currencies and paper currencies, meaning silver, so that it is valid at that time to buy gold with silver with a difference, because the Shari'ah says: and otherwise , and it also mentioned the remaining five types, which are silver, dates, wheat, and barley.