Are pairs ever flipped?

Guys, it's late, my head is swimming, and there are only stupid questions left in my tired mind.

So here's the stupid question: Have the market makers ever, or would they ever, flip the order of a pair to reflect changing values between the currencies?

If you're not sure what I'm getting at, what would happen if USD fell to, say, 0.2000 against CAD. Would it still be referred to on the markets as USDCAD, or, at some point, would they actually flip the pair so that it was commonly referred to as CADUSD?

Most of the pairs are commonly referred to with the more-valuable currency in front (USDJPY, GBPUSD, etc.) But what would happen if the previously-greater-valued currency fell precipitously against its partner? Would the "official" moniker ever be switched to reflect the new relative value?

no

I think the original quote is "The LOVE of money is the root of all evil"

No, they are the way they are. AUD has never been worth more than USD, yet it's listed first and that won't change even if AUD becomes stronger long-term.

Rob

The original quote is from 1st Timothy, and yes, it does refer to the LOVE of money. However, I have not quoted the Bible. As you can see, I quoted Ayn Rand. To be more specific, I quoted one of the key characters - Francisco d'Anconia - from her seminal work Atlas Shrugged.

http://www.capmag.com/article.asp?ID=1826

This line is the opening salvo in Francisco's money speech. The impetus for the speech is that he is specifically responding to one of the looters, who has just flippantly recited the (mis)quotation that "money is the root of all evil".

Sorry to side track your thread. I did realise that your signature was a quote by Ayn Rand, and not the Biblical quote. It's just one of those things that bugs me. Every time I see or hear it without the word love in it, regardless of the context, it irritates me because with out that one little word the whole quote has a completely different meaning, and most people have never heard the original. Once again sorry for side track.

it is possible. like if USDCAD devalued enough, say to like 0.0234 or something, it might switch. it is definitely possible, but i think it would be more of a case by case thing. not all brokers would necessarily do it

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Currency_pair

The rules for formulating standard currency pair notations result from accepted priorities attributed to each currency. From its inception in 1999 and as stipulated by the European Central Bank, the euro has first precedence as a base currency. Therefore, all currency pairs involving it should use it as their base, listed first. For example, the US dollar and euro exchange rate is identified as EUR/USD.
Although there is no standards setting body or ruling organization, the established priority ranking of the major currencies is:

 

1. euro
2. pound sterling
3. Australian dollar
4. New Zealand dollar
5. United States dollar
6. Canadian dollar
7. Swiss franc
8. Japanese Yen

Historically, this was established by a ranking according to the relative values of the currencies with respect to each other, but the introduction of the euro and other market factors have broken the original price rankings.
Other currencies (the Minors) are generally quoted against one of the major currencies.

... so, what it this:

http://www.google.com/finance?q=EURUSD
http://www.google.com/finance?q=USDEUR

Hmmm. These are questions I've never asked myself. Why does EUR come before USD? Or is it the chicken before the egg or the egg before the chicken?

Don't confuse listings on price-quoting sites like Google and Yahoo with the "official" pair priorities. If you go to Google/Yahoo (and I'm sure many others) you can choose to show ANY currency in relation to ANY other currency. So you could show USDGBP, JPYUSD, GBPEUR, etc. Just because you can configure these sites to show any combination of pairs, doesn't mean that those combinations constitute the official priorities in the currency markets.