Except for the three banks still
on the United States’ blacklist, all banks in Myanmar with permission
to conduct international banking can make transactions with US
companies, bankers here said.
They said that the recent removal of
four Myanmar banks from the US blacklist created the misunderstanding
that only those four banks could conduct transactions with US
businesses.
Cooperative Bank managing director Pe
Myint said sanctions differed from the blacklist. “Sanctions are imposed
on the country, while certain individuals are blacklisted. Our bank has
not been blacklisted, but sanctions apply to all the banks in the
country,” Pe Myint said.
“Since half of the sanctions were eased
last year, we can begin [some transactions]. But those [banks]
blacklisted cannot although sanctions have been eased. Only when they
are cleared from the blacklist, can they conduct business [with US
businesses],” he said.
Kanbawza Bank director for international
banking Nyo Myint said his bank has been making transactions with US
companies since the sanctions were eased last year. “Our bank has never
been blacklisted by the US,” he said. “We have been providing letters of
credit and telex transfer services. We are also working with US
financial institutions like VISA, MasterCard and Western Union”.
On February 22, US Department of the
Treasury declared that US banks can make transactions with four Myanmar
banks: two state-run banks, Myanmar Investment and Commercial Bank and
Myanmar Economic Bank; and two privately owned banks, Asia Green
Development Bank and Ayeyarwaddy Bank.
The four were previously blacklisted.
Although those banks are now allowed to
open individual and corporate accounts and make financial transactions
with US companies, they are still restricted from forming joint ventures
with US banks.
The remaining three banks on the US
blacklist are military-owned Innwa Bank and Myawaddy Bank and state-run
Myanmar Foreign Trade Bank.
Last year the US began lifting sanctions it imposed on Myanmar from 1990 to 2011.
The Central Bank permits 11 of Myanmar’s
19 private banks and three of its four state-owned banks to conduct
international banking.
Foreign banks are not allowed to operate wholly owned subsidiaries, but 28 have representative offices here.
source: Eleven Myanmar
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