Private banks launch int'l trade payment services
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Myanmar private banks launch services for international trade payments after the United States eased certain sanctions, a source close to the banking community revealed.
In the middle of July, the Central Bank of Myanmar gave 11 private banks permission to carry out letters of credit and inter-bank transfer services. However, only some of them were able to complete the transactions efficiently. Some banks have also started US dollar-based currency movements this month.
Bank officials, meanwhile, said the main obstacle to providing full service was the lack of capital, experience, international relations and connections.
“Now it takes about four days to open a letter of credit, but I hope the inter-bank operations will become more efficient soon,” Nyo Myint, managing director of the foreign bank operation division of Kanbawza Bank, said.
Although the central bank has given private banks permission to deal with both American and Singaporean dollars as well as euros, banks preferred to deal with the greenback.
Previously Myanmar had to rely on banks in Singapore to complete international transactions due to sanctions on financial services imposed by the European Union and the US.
Since 1963, these transactions could only be done by state-owned banks, until last month, when US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told Myanmar President Thein Sein that her country would take steps to ease the bank on imports.
Earlier last month, the US Congress approved a bill that would lift the ban on US participation in providing development loans from international financial institutions to Myanmar.
