Costs of Myanmar's multiple exchange-rate regime

Abstract

Myanmar's multiple exchange-rate regime creates various economic distortions. This paper describes the exchange-rate practices in Myanmar and develops a model of foreign exchange markets to estimate the welfare costs imposed by the current regime. Our analysis suggests that the equilibrium exchange rate could be around 400–500 kyat per US dollar, and trade openness measured using the equilibrium rate increases to more than 20% of gross domestic product (GDP) from less than 1% in the official statistics. The total welfare loss caused by the current regime is estimated to be in the order of 14–17% of GDP.