CIT Upholds AFA Reversal for Aussie Exporter; Dumping Margin Drops by Over 90%
The Commerce Department properly reversed its reliance on adverse facts available in an antidumping duty review, lowering the dumping rate for respondent BlueScope Steel from 99.20% to 4.95%, the Court of International Trade ruled in an Aug. 30 opinion. Commerce dropped the use of AFA from the review after issuing a supplemental questionnaire to BlueScope to get U.S. sales quantity and value reporting data from the respondent.
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The opinion comes in a case stemming from the first administrative review of the AD order on hot-rolled steel flat products from Australia, covering entries in 2016-17, in which BlueScope served as mandatory respondent. During the review, it was revealed that all of BlueScope's exports -- made through its affiliate Australian Iron & Steel -- went to its U.S. affiliate, which then entered the merchandise and resold it to yet another affiliate, Steelscape, BlueScope's affiliated processor. The only sales in the U.S. to unaffiliated customers were of merchandise further processed by Steelscape.
During the review, Commerce issued Section A supplemental questionnaires to BlueScope and its affiliates on their U.S. home market and third-country market sales. To show this information, BlueScope gave the agency two charts, one showing constructed export price (CEP) sales and entries of subject merchandise, and the other showing the total amount of Steelscape's sales of further processed merchandise and the total quantity of AIS's sales of hot-rolled steel flat products in the U.S. through the affiliated transactions. These charts show an exact match between Steelscape's sales of further processed merchandise to unaffiliated customers and the quantity of CEP sales, the court said.
Nevertheless, Commerce tossed BlueScope's U.S. sales quantity and value reporting, taking issue with the form of the data submitted. The court, though, said that these were invalid grounds on which to establish AFA, sending the case back to Commerce (see 2112080060). On remand, Commerce dropped its reliance on AFA after issuing the exporter a supplemental questionnaire (see 2204150042).
Judge Richard Eaton then upheld the remand results seeing as no party contested the findings. "Commerce has complied with the court’s remand instructions, and its findings on remand are supported by substantial evidence and in accordance with law," the opinion said. "Accordingly, the court sustains the Remand Results."
(BlueScope Steel v. United States, Slip Op. 22-102, CIT #19-00057, dated 08/30/22, Judge Richard Eaton. Attorneys: Christopher Dunn of Curtis Mallet-Prevost for plaintiff BlueScope; Kelly Krystyniak for defendant U.S. government; Sarah Shulman of Cassidy Levy for defendant-intervenor U.S. Steel Corp.)