Part 4 of 9
Where to exchange money in Najaf: Exchange Street, Rawan Street and the companies headquartered in the city
Najaf is the only city outside Baghdad and Erbil where large exchange companies keep their head office. Where the street of exchangers is, who is listed, and how pilgrims and residents are quoted.
Read the one before this?
Where to exchange money in Baghdad: Harthiya, Karrada, Shorja and the companies that sell dollars at the official rate
Najaf has 58 licensed exchange companies on the Central Bank’s register, the third-largest count in Iraq after Baghdad and Basra, and something neither of those cities can claim in the same way: two of the country’s larger exchange chains, Al-Rayan and Atta Al-Ghari, are headquartered here rather than in the capital. Millions of pilgrims pass through every year with foreign currency to change, and the city’s exchangers have grown to meet them.
Exchange Street and Rawan Street
Najaf’s money market has a street named after it. Exchange Street, opposite Najaf City Mall, is a run of licensed companies where the dollar1,588+0.52% price is set for the city each morning; Al-Elaf is here. A few blocks away, Rawan Street holds the head office of Atta Al-Ghari and the office of Al-Falah International, and shares its pavement with the gold dealers of the Grand Bazaar cluster, the same currency-and-gold pattern found in every Iraqi city.
Ghadeer Street, next to the College of Administration and Economics, is where Al-Rayan keeps the head office of its seven-city network, and where Al-Qand‘s Najaf branch sits in the Ghadeer (Furat) area. Al-Fanjan has a city branch and, unusually, a travel-dollar counter inside Najaf airport.
The offices DinarView lists
| Company | Where | Board online | Phone | Hours |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Al-Rayan (head office) | Ghadeer Street | Blocked to readers | +964 780 095 0950 | Daily, Friday closed |
| Atta Al-Ghari (head office) | Rawan Street; second branch on Muthanna Street | Empty | +964 780 103 3338 | Saturday–Thursday 08:00–19:00 |
| Al-Elaf | Exchange Street, opposite Najaf City Mall | No | — | Daily |
| Al-Falah International | Rawan Street | No | — | Daily |
| Al-Qand, Najaf branch | Ghadeer (Furat) | No | 7525 | Saturday–Thursday 09:00–21:00 |
| Al-Fanjan, Najaf branch | City and Najaf airport | No | +964 780 900 0072 | Daily |
The six, with maps, are on the Najaf page. None carries a tick yet. Al-Rayan publishes a board, but behind a browser check that DinarView’s collector cannot pass; Atta Al-Ghari’s board page renders empty. The Najaf page therefore shows no number, and says so, rather than presenting Baghdad’s figure as Najaf’s.
How Najaf quotes
Dinars per $100, buy and sell, for new-series notes, like every other Iraqi market. Najaf’s price follows Baghdad’s within the hour; the two cities are close and the chains that trade in both keep them aligned. Expect the counter spread to be 250 to 500 dinars per $100 on Exchange Street, tighter for larger amounts, wider for small notes and at hotel counters near the shrine.
Iranian toman227,900−1.13% is the second currency of Najaf, because most of the city’s pilgrims arrive from Iran. Toman is quoted in dinars per 100,000 or per million and moves far more than the dollar; ask twice and write the number down. Pakistani rupees, Indian rupees and Bahraini and Kuwaiti dinars also trade here in volume during the pilgrimage seasons, and the street quotes them against the dollar first.
The pilgrim’s guide
- Change on Exchange Street, not at the shrine. Counters within sight of the shrine quote worse by several thousand dinars per $100. The street is a ten-minute walk.
- The airport counter sells at the official rate. Al-Fanjan’s counter in Najaf airport is a travel-dollar window for departing Iraqis with a passport and ticket, at the Central Bank’s 1,310. It is not where an arriving pilgrim changes toman.
- Hours during Arbaeen and Ashura. The chains extend their hours through the pilgrimage; the souq keeps to daylight. Friday is closed at Al-Rayan and Atta Al-Ghari.
- Ask for the licence. Every company in the table is on the Central Bank’s register. Unlicensed money-changers work the crowds in season; the price is rarely better and the risk is entirely yours.
Why Najaf matters to the national rate
Najaf’s chains do not only serve Najaf. Al-Rayan’s branches in Erbil, Sulaymaniyah, Baghdad, Basra, Samawa and Kut, and Atta Al-Ghari’s agents in Baghdad, mean that a price decided on Ghadeer Street in the morning is quoted in six other cities by noon. When Al-Rayan’s board becomes readable, DinarView gains a source for seven cities at once, two of which no other company covers. That single capture is the most valuable open item on the site’s list.
A worked example: a pilgrim’s five million toman
A pilgrim arriving from Iran with five million toman needs dinars for a week. At the national toman figure on this site’s toman page, about 70,100 dinars per 100,000 toman on the day this guide was written, the five million are worth roughly 3.5 million dinars. On Exchange Street the office quotes toman in dinars per 100,000, and its buy price in season can sit two or three percent under the feed, because toman is arriving faster than it is leaving. Two or three percent of 3.5 million is 70,000 to 105,000 dinars, the cost of a week’s meals, and it is the difference between changing at the first counter near the shrine and walking ten minutes to compare two on the street. The dollar leg is simpler: $200 at a buy price near 154,600 per $100 brings 309,200 dinars, and every licensed counter will be within a few hundred dinars of that.
Two chains, two models
Al-Rayan and Atta Al-Ghari are both Najaf companies and they are built differently. Al-Rayan is a joint-stock company with branches in seven cities, an app built by a UAE developer and a board on its website that quotes all seven at once; it warns publicly about impersonators using its name. Atta Al-Ghari is a family company with two Najaf offices, a Karbala branch and a network of agents in Baghdad who quote its price under their own names. The first is a retail network with one price; the second is a wholesale house whose price reaches the street through partners. When Al-Rayan’s board becomes readable, it will give DinarView seven cities in one source; Atta Al-Ghari’s price will only ever be captured by asking.
Questions readers ask
Is Najaf cheaper than Baghdad for dollars? Not meaningfully. The two markets are aligned by the same companies; a difference of a few hundred dinars per $100 either way is normal and does not justify a trip.
Can I change toman to dollars directly? On Exchange Street, yes. The office will do it through the dinar and quote you the result; ask what dinar rate it used so you can compare with DinarView’s toman page.
Why does DinarView show no Najaf number? Because no Najaf board can be read yet. The site lists the offices with their phones so you can get the day’s price by calling, and will show a figure the day a board opens.
Do the offices take old-series dollars? At a discount, and some refuse them. Large-head 2013-series and later notes in good condition get the board price.