BlameThePixel!

Quoted :: The Straight Dope

A common myth is that if a currency is worth less than $1, it's weaker than the U.S. dollar, and if it's worth more, then it's stronger. Your Latvian friend is trying to pull this on you, but it's nonsense.

There is no necessary relationship between the exchange rate of a foreign currency relative to the U.S. dollar and the strength of the issuing country's economy or its wealth. Consider a few examples. Some of the strongest currencies other than the U.S. dollar (that is, ones preferred by investors, because their value is stable) are the British pound (at 0.63 per dollar), the Japanese yen (at 116 per dollar), the Swiss franc (at 1.40 per dollar), and the European euro (at 0.90 per dollar). The yen is a particularly striking case. Although the Japanese have had their problems in recent years, they still have one of the largest economies in the world and are wealthy by any standard. Yet one yen is worth less than a penny.

Currencies worth more than a dollar include the Bahrain dinar (at 0.38 per dollar), the Maltese lira (at 0.38 per dollar) the Cayman Islands dollar (at 0.83 per dollar), the Omani real (at 0.38 per dollar) and the Jordanian dinar (at 0.70 per dollar.) All of these are from small-to-tiny countries with economies to match and in some cases considerable poverty. The gross domestic product of Jordan, for example, was only U.S. $1,553 per capita in 1998. None of these currencies is a major factor in international trade.