Thai shrimp producer/exporters appealed the decision of the Court of International Trade upholding the refusal of the International Trade Administration to grant an offset for interest income on long-term financial assets when calculating dumping margins, in the February 2007 - January 2008 AD administrative review of certain frozen warm water shrimp from Brazil, Ecuador, India, and Thailand. The Thai producers argued that the long-term financial assets on which they earned interest income was required to be held as collateral for credit lines used for day-to-day operating funds, and the ITA should therefore apply it as an offset to interest expense in the overhead expense ratio that the ITA calculates as a component of normal value (thereby reducing normal value and dumping margins).
The Court of International Trade has ruled, due to untimely claims, it cannot grant relief to two companies that sought refunds of EU beef hormone dispute duties assessed on merchandise entered after the duties were retroactively terminated. According to the CIT, the companies' complaints were filed more than two years after the action that triggered accrual of their claims -- which was the date CBP liquidated the entries and not the date of the CAFC's 2010 ruling that the retaliatory duties were terminated by operation of law in 2007.
The Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit ruled that countervailing duties may not be imposed on goods from China or other non-market economies1, upholding a decision by the Court of International Trade, but on different grounds than the lower court, and overturning the attempts by the International Trade Administration since 2007 to apply CV duties to goods from China (a reversal of its earlier policy of not applying CVD law in NMEs).
Two companies with a challenge to the International Trade Administration’s practice of zeroing (eliminating non-dumped sales from the margin calculation) pending at the Court of International Trade sought to delay the adjudication of their case until four other cases that address the same issue, and that are at a more advanced stage, are definitively resolved. The companies, Myonic GmbH and New Hampshire Ball Bearings, Inc., argued that a stay would “promote judicial economy and enable all parties to conserve resources.”
The Court of International Trade has issued new remand instructions in the May 2005-April 2006 AD duty administrative review of ball bearings and parts thereof from France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Singapore, and the United Kingdom, following an earlier decision by the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit that permitted the use of third-party costs for the first time under the order but required an explanation of the approach from the International Trade Administration.
The Court of International Trade once again remanded to the International Trade Administration the agency‘s “separate rate” determination for Chinese producer/exporter Since Hardware (Guangzhou) Co., Ltd., in the August 2006 - July 2007 AD administrative review of floor-standing metal-top ironing tables and certain parts thereof from China.
The Court of International Trade has ruled in favor of U.S. Customs and Border Protection in Ford Motor Company v. U.S., denying Ford's claims for a refund of duties under NAFTA after untimely filing its NAFTA certificates of origin beyond the statutory one year limit. The CIT agreed with CBP that a valid refund claim exists only when the importer has filed all required documentation. As such, all components of a claim, including copies of the certificates of origin, must be filed within one year of importation.
Korean producer Union Steel Manufacturing Co., Ltd. challenged the International Trade Administration’s model match, which made price comparisons between painted and laminated products, and its use of zeroing (disregarding non-dumped sales transactions in the margin calculation) in the August 2005 - July 2006 AD duty administrative review of certain corrosion-resistant carbon steel flat products from Korea. Following two remands, the Court of International Trade affirmed the ITA’s revised model match, in which it ultimately conceded it would not treat painted, non-laminated corrosion-resistant carbon steel flat products as identical to more costly laminated products in U.S.-to-home-market price comparisons.
Broker Power is providing readers with some of the top stories for November 14-18, 2011 in case they were missed last week.
The Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has ruled that the two year time limit in 19 USC 1515(a) for CBP to decide protests is not mandatory. Hitachi Home Electronics (America) Inc. had argued that all protests not allowed or denied within the two-year statutory time period should automatically be “deemed allowed by operation of law.” The CAFC said that the time limit is merely directory, and 28 USC 1581(i)1 jurisdiction for this case is not triggered if CBP fails to act in the two year period.