How can I convert currency strings to numerical values?

Question

Is there a way to convert currency strings to floating values, for example:

$1,138.15
$ 29.10
$2,195.34

Should be converted to:

1138.15
29.10
2195.34

Some currency strings have space between the dollar sign and the dollar value.

I am doing this because I am extracting the cost values from PDFs (which are converted to txt files) and do arithmetic on them. For example, a portion of text file looks like this:

Fixed Power

$1,138.15

General Admin Surcharge

$ 29.10

Customer Charge

$2,195.34

And my code looks like this:

$sourceFile = Get-Content $sourcePath\$($filenames[0]).txt

$fixedPower = $sourceFile[(
    Select-String `
        -Path $sourcePath\$($filenames[0]).txt `
        -Pattern "Fixed Power" `
        -List
).LineNumber + 1]

$generalAdminSurcharge = $sourceFile[(
    Select-String `
        -Path $sourcePath\$($filenames[0]).txt `
        -Pattern "General Admin Surcharge" `
        -List
).LineNumber + 1]

$customerCharge = $sourceFile[(
    Select-String `
        -Path $sourcePath\$($filenames[0]).txt `
        -Pattern "Customer Charge" `
        -List
).LineNumber + 1]

But those only extract the costs into string values.

Cardiovascular

Answer 1

$Test = '$1,138.15','$ 29.10','$2,195.34'

$Test |
 foreach { $_ -replace '[^0-9.]'}


1138.15
29.10
2195.34

If you want the trailing 0 you'll have to leave it as [string] until you do whaterver calculations you want with it.

To

...or more succinctly, $Test -replace '[^\d.]'. – Temporary

Answer 2

You could do a Replace to remove whatever extra things you want gone from the string, and then cast it as a [decimal]

[decimal]$customerCharge = $customerCharge -replace "(\$| |,)"

Edit: Of coarse mjolinor beat me to it, and did it better. Man he's good!

Buttonhole

Answer 3

Even though this post has an answer already, the answer does not handle negative values indicated by either () or -. Since this is the question that pops up when googling how to parse a currency string into a decimal value in PowerShell, I figured I would leave an update.

For brevity in the code examples, I am using the enum int value directly rather than the enum name.

[System.Globalization.NumberStyles]

Instead of 383, you should really be using:

[System.Globalization.NumberStyles]::Currency

Using [decimal]::TryParse() - method returns bool indicating status of parsing attempt, if successful, method returns $True and the reference variable is populated with the parsed value, otherwise the method returns $False and the reference variable is set to 0.

New-Variable -Name test -Force
$null = [decimal]::TryParse('-$ 1,200.20' , 383, (Get-Culture).NumberFormat, [ref]$test); $test
$null = [decimal]::TryParse('($ 1,200.20)', 383, (Get-Culture).NumberFormat, [ref]$test); $test
$null = [decimal]::TryParse('$1,200.20'   , 383, (Get-Culture).NumberFormat, [ref]$test); $test
$null = [decimal]::TryParse('$1200.20'    , 383, (Get-Culture).NumberFormat, [ref]$test); $test
$null = [decimal]::TryParse('$ 1200.2'    , 383, (Get-Culture).NumberFormat, [ref]$test); $test
$null = [decimal]::TryParse('$1200'       , 383, (Get-Culture).NumberFormat, [ref]$test); $test

Using [decimal]::Parse() - Either is successful, or throws an exception.

[decimal]::Parse('-$ 1,200.20' , 383, (Get-Culture).NumberFormat) # Returns '-1200.20'
[decimal]::Parse('($ 1,200.20)', 383, (Get-Culture).NumberFormat) # Returns '-1200.20'
[decimal]::Parse('$(1,200.20)' , 383, (Get-Culture).NumberFormat) # Returns '-1200.20'
[decimal]::Parse('$1,200.20'   , 383, (Get-Culture).NumberFormat) # Returns '1200.20'
[decimal]::Parse('$1200.20'    , 383, (Get-Culture).NumberFormat) # Returns '1200.20'
[decimal]::Parse('$ 1200.2'    , 383, (Get-Culture).NumberFormat) # Returns '1200.2'
[decimal]::Parse('$1200'       , 383, (Get-Culture).NumberFormat) # Returns '1200'

This answer was adapated from a similar answer for C#: Convert currency string to decimal?

Just a tip to future readers, if you can't find the answer to what you need under the PowerShell tag, try searching under C# / .NET. You'll likely be able to find the answer there, and then you can adapt the answer to use in PowerShell, which is how I came up with this answer.

Ungrudging