Currency format for display

Question

Is there a way to format the correct currency representation for a country?

Example UK -£127.54 Netherlands € 127,54- USA $127.54

etc..

Some things to

Answer 1

The problem with taking a given number and displaying it with .ToString("C", culture) is that it effectively changes the amount to the default currency of the given culture. If you have a given amount, the ISO currency code of that amount, and you want to display it for a given culture, I would recommend just creating a decimal extension method like the one below. This will not automatically assume that the currency is in the default currency of the culture:

public static string ToFormattedCurrencyString(
    this decimal currencyAmount,
    string isoCurrencyCode,
CultureInfo userCulture)
{
    var userCurrencyCode = new RegionInfo(userCulture.Name).ISOCurrencySymbol;

    if (userCurrencyCode == isoCurrencyCode)
    {
        return currencyAmount.ToString("C", userCulture);
    }

    return string.Format(
        "{0} {1}", 
        isoCurrencyCode, 
        currencyAmount.ToString("N2", userCulture));
}

This will either use the local currency symbol or the ISO currency code with the amount -- whichever is more appropriate. More on the topic in this blog post.