Hello. I'm Margot Politis. Welcome to another episode of Study English, IELTS preparation.
Today we're going to listen to a finance report. It's filled with numbers and amounts, expressed
in a variety of ways.
It's important to be able to understand and describe numerical data using decimals, fractions
and currencies.
Listen to the day's finance report.
The Australian dollar, today Tuesday the 11th of November, continues to rise against the
US dollar, buying just over 70 cents, a 15 year high.
Against other currencies, however, the trend is a little different, falling against the
pound, closing at 0.425, a slight drop on yesterday, and 0.61 euros. The yen is also
strengthening at 71.95, and considerably higher against the greenback at 111.03 yen.
The Dow Jones Index closed today at 9809.79, a fall of 47.18 on yesterday's trading.
The Sydney Stock Market doubled its trading yesterday with BHP Billiton trading heavily.
The latest retail figures showed that turnover grew by 3.2% in the June quarter, the fastest
quarterly growth rate for five and a half years. At the same time, unemployment fell
to its lowest level in twelve and a half years.
OK, first we're going to look at decimals, and how you express them. Listen carefully
again.
Against other currencies, however, the trend is a little different, falling against the
pound, closing at 0.425, a slight drop on yesterday, and 0.61 euros. The yen is also
strengthening at 71.95, and considerably higher against the greenback at 111.03 yen.
The Dow Jones Index closed today at 9809.79, a fall of 47.18 on yesterday's trading.
In English, decimals are written with a point, not a comma.
So we write 4.25, 6.1.
When you say the numbers after the decimal point, you say them all separately, as individual
numbers.
So we have:
seventy one point nine five
forty seven point one eight
nine thousand eight hundred and nine point seven nine
Notice that a zero is often spoken as 'oh'.
Practice saying these numbers:
three hundred and twenty six point oh one
four point eight nine seven
nine hundred and two point three oh eight
Listen again:
Against other currencies, however, the trend is a little different, falling against the
pound, closing at 0.425, a slight drop on yesterday, and 0.61 euros. The yen is also
strengthening at 71.95, and considerably higher against the greenback at 111.03 yen.
The Dow Jones Index closed today at 9809.79, a fall of 47.18 on yesterday's trading.
The Sydney Stock Market doubled its trading yesterday with BHP Billiton trading heavily.
You can hear that when using numbers, there are often alternatives, and many choices you
can make.
So conversationally, we would usually say one hundred and eleven point oh three, but
will also often hear one hundred and eleven point zero three.
Here, we could say: zero point four two five
nought point four two five or even just point four two five
Notice that in North America, people usually say zero, not nought or 'oh'.
OK, now the other way of expressing numbers less than one is using fractions.
Listen to the fractions here.
The latest retail figures showed that turnover grew by 3.2% in the June quarter, the fastest
quarterly growth rate for five and a half years. At the same time, unemployment fell
to its lowest level in twelve and a half years.
She uses the most common fraction - a half.
Listen to how we say common fractions:
a half
a third
a quarter
two thirds
five eights
three quarters
Notice that once you understand the pattern, you can express any fraction you want.
Try these:
seven eighteenths
16 thirtieths
14 fortieths
OK, now listen again to some of the report. Listen for different currencies:
Against other currencies, however, the trend is a little different, falling against the
pound, closing at 0.425, a slight drop on yesterday, and 0.61 euros. The yen is also
strengthening at 71.95, and considerably higher against the greenback at 111.03 yen.
There were a number of different currencies mentioned in that clip:
the pound; the euro; the yen; the greenback.
Let's have a look at them.
Lots of countries use a dollar.
In Australia, the Australian dollar is usually expressed with the dollar sign.
But internationally, it's written like this AUD. We read this the Australian dollar.
In United States, they use the dollar as well. It's the USD, the United States dollar. But
often called the greenback, because it's green.
In Great Britain they use the pound. It is written GBP, but it's often called the pound
sterling.
In the European Union, they use the euro dollar, written like this - EUR.
In Japan, it's the yen, written JPY.
In China, it's the yuan, written CNY, and the renminbi, RMB.
Notice that we write the currency before the number, but we say it after the number.
So we read:
two dollars.
or four pounds fifteen.
Notice also how we read longer numbers:
three thousand, four hundred and seventy Japanese yen
one hundred and ninety two Australian dollars
Notice that when spoken naturally the one often becomes 'a' and the 'and' becomes squashed.
We don't say one hundred and ninety two but a hundred n ninety two.
Try this one:
a hundred and twenty seven thousand, three hundred and twenty two Hong Kong dollars
OK, now let's listen to the report again, and then we'll look at another important use
of numbers.
The Australian dollar, today Tuesday the 11th of November, continues to rise against the
US dollar, buying just over 70 cents, a 15 year high.
Notice that she says Tuesday the 11th of November.
Saying simple things like the date can be confusing in English, as the way they're said
varies.
In Australia, we say the 11th of November, or November the 11th. Notice that it's written
without the words 'the', or 'of'.
For the 13th of February 2005, Australians would write this: 13.05.2005.
But in North America, they'd write it: 02.13.2005.
You'll need to learn these to make sure you don't turn up somewhere on the wrong day!
So remember that in Australia they write the date: day dot month dot year,
but in North America, they write: month dot day dot year.
And there is an international standard that says the format should be: year dot month
dot day.
With numbers, dates, times, there are all sorts of variations. Just make sure you understand
the currency, the time and the date, or you could find yourself in all sorts of trouble!
And I'll see you soon for more Study English!
Bye bye.