From 65438 to 0979, China's foreign trade management system began to reform, and foreign trade was changed from a state-owned foreign trade department to a number of operations. Because China's prices have been set by the state plan for a long time, many commodity prices are low and the price ratio is unbalanced, which leads to a large price gap between domestic and foreign markets and export losses, making it impossible for the RMB exchange rate to take into account both trade and non-trade aspects. In order to strengthen economic accounting and meet the needs of foreign trade system reform, the State Council decided to implement two exchange rate systems from 198 1, that is, to set the internal settlement price of trade foreign exchange separately and keep the official quotation as the settlement price of non-trade foreign exchange. This is the so-called "dual exchange rate system" or "dual exchange rate system".
The official quotation of RMB 1980 is USD 1 = RMB 1.5 yuan. During the period from 198 1 to 1 984 to 12, China implemented the internal settlement price of trade foreign exchange, and the trade foreign exchange was 1 USD =2.80 RMB. The official quotation is non-trade foreign exchange 1 USD = 1.50 RMB. The former is mainly applicable to the settlement of import and export trade and trade ancillary expenses; The latter is mainly applicable to the exchange and settlement of non-trade foreign exchange, and the original weighted average calculation method of a basket of currencies is still adopted. "Dual-track" exchange rate: the export income of enterprises is divided into two parts, one part must be turned over to the state at a lower official exchange rate, and the other part can be sold or imported as profitable commodities at swap market exchange rate according to market supply and demand signals.
The "dual-track system" is a trial-and-error mechanism based on the state; This is a controversial trial and error mechanism. According to the experts who originally designed this reform plan, when the planned economy was still dominant at that time, the state not only protected and closed the stock (protecting and saving vested interests), but also cultivated and developed the increment (market and new forces), which was a gradual reform idea. However, as soon as the price dual-track system of "combination of release and adjustment" was introduced, it became a lame play of "only release is not adjusted and release is not smooth", which led to rampant speculation and aroused strong dissatisfaction and complaints from the society. In this regard, some well-known economists in China, such as Wu Jinglian, have sharply criticized that "the dual-track system is equivalent to implementing the dual rules of driving on the left and driving on the right at the same time on the same road, which will inevitably lead to" collision "and chaos, and encourage the phenomenon of" power rent-seeking "of prices inside and outside the plan". According to the data studied by Hu Heli, a scholar of the State Council Development Research Center, the spread of state-controlled goods exceeds150 billion yuan, the spread of bank loans exceeds 1 138 1000 billion yuan, and the difference of foreign exchange rate for import exceeds 93.043 billion yuan. How can you not let the "third hand" move with such a generous bonus? Therefore, in the middle and late 1980s, a "national business craze" appeared in the society. Finding relationships, entering through the back door, making plans, approving notes and running a company have become shortcuts to getting rich overnight.