MYANMAR – In the domestic market, the USD exchange rate is said to have gone on a continuous upwards trend to reach over 6,400 Kyats per USD.
“The closing price yesterday (August 16) was 6,000 Kyats per USD. But the exchange rate went up and up today (August 17). Now, it is 6,400 Kyats per USD. It is still trending upwards even though it’s a weekend,” said a foreign currency exchange broker from Yangon.
Moreover, the exchange rate of THB is also reported to have reached 180 Kyats per THB, with many Hundi services seeing an extraordinarily huge amount of exchange from Kyat to THB.
“There are many bank transfers of Kyat. THB exchange rate is also continuously going up. When exchanging Kyat to THB, one lakh of Kyat only yields around 540 THB and when exchanging THB to Kyat, you can get one lakh of Kyat for 580 THB. For now, the value of Kyat is still depreciating,” said a THB to Kyat Hundi service.
Just in recent days, USD exchange rate hit 7,000 Kyats per USD and the THB exchange rate also reached 200 Kyats per THB.
Meanwhile, the gold price is said to be hovering between 80 and 80 lakhs per tical of gold is expected to be heading back to the record high of 85 lakhs per tical.
“The global gold price went up so it pulled the domestic price as well. Since both the USD exchange rate and global gold price went up, the domestic gold price is going up even more,” explained a Yangon based gold trader.
