Baht volatility has gained pace since the beginning of this year, in line with regional currencies, a central banker said on Monday.
The volatility of the baht was 4.38% from 3.2% while those of the Malaysian ringgit accelerated to 13% from 9% and the Singapore dollar to 8.7% from 5.1% - all on the upward trend, said Chantavan Sucharitkul, assistant governor of the Bank of Thailand.
The local currency has gained a little more than 1% since the beginning of the year, on par with the Indonesian rupiah and the Singapore dollar, while the Malaysian ringgit was 3% stronger, said Mrs Chantavan.
"The baht movement has been in line with regional currencies so Thailand is not at a disadvantage to its neighbours in terms of foreign exchange rates.
"The central bank has no plans to ease outflow rules to curb the stronger baht. The relaxation increases financial efficiency by allowing companies and people to buy foreign currencies or invest more flexibly," she said.
Charl Kengchon, president of Kasikornbank Research Center, said the chance was low that the central bank would resort to monetary policy or cutting policy interest rate to rein in the strong baht.
"The central bank will have to take into consideration many factors such as exports, growth, public investment, etc. If government spending meets the target, the central bank will be less pressured to resort to monetary policy. However, it will take a while to analyse all data.
"Importantly, we need to monitor the Federal Reserve's interest rate trend or whether it can raise the rate 3-4 times this year as anticipated," he said.
If the Fed increases its key interest rate, it's highly unlikely the Bank of Thailand will cut its policy rate or ease outflows to stabilise the baht or to stimulate the economy, he added.
Money traders at Kasikornbank forecast the baht will move in a range between 35.35 and 35.65 to the dollar. The factors to watch are how money markets react to soon-to-be-announced key US economic data.
However, few changes may be seen as Chinese markets are closed all week for the Lunar New Year holidays.