Convert string to decimal on Groovy & Grails

/**
* convert string from param to decimal type
* @param val
* @return Decimal
*/
def getStrToBigDecimal(String val) {
String stringNumber = val.toString()
stringNumber = stringNumber.replaceAll("[,]|[(]|[)]|[\$]", '')
Float number = 0
if (stringNumber.isNumber()) {
number = Float.parseFloat(stringNumber)
if (val.toString()?.endsWith(")")) {
number = -number
}
}
return number
}