I am leaving Swtizerland soon and was wondering if people have any advice on most cost-effective way to maximize the FX benefits when converting CHF to USD. Is it most cost effective to do so with a Swiss bank and then once in USD wire the money back or vice versa? Is there any other solution where no bank takes a bid/ask spread?
Search search search..... look for transferwise.com in this forum and read the results. It's a common question!
My guess is that a Swiss based conversion will be cheaper; US retail banking operations are much less geared up for retail customers doing forex.
Unless you work for a bank, you will always end up pay a spread. I strongly suggest that you convert your CHF to USD before leaving Switzerland rather than sending CHF to your US bank and converting it afterwards. Depending on your bank, receiving CHF may not even be possible.
I use interactive brokers which is an online brokerage that also does currency conversions. The spread is negligible. (like 1/100 of 1 cent) It would make sense if you are also looking for a cheap broker. (1$ per trade)