Costs of Myanmar's multiple exchange-rate regime

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.