The Commerce Department found on remand that antidumping duty respondent Power Steel Co. did not pay Section 232 duties on two entries of steel concrete rebar, dropping the duties paid as part of the exporter's sales price used to establish its base export price in an antidumping duty administrative review. Submitting its remand results to the Court of International Trade on April 8, Commerce lowered Power Steel's dumping margin from 3.27% to 0.01%, locking in a finding that Power Steel did not make sales at less than normal value (Power Steel Co., Ltd. v. United States, CIT #20-03771).

The Commerce Department granted a level-of-trade (LOT) adjustment for antidumping duty respondent Productos Laminados de Monterrey (Prolamsa) on remand at the Court of International Trade, reversing course from its previous position. Finding that the totality of evidence supports the position that Prolamsa made sales at two levels of trade, Commerce dropped Prolamsa's dumping rate from 7.47% to 0.89% (Productos Laminados de Monterrey S.A. de C.V. v. U.S., CIT #20-00166).

The Commerce Department erred in using an allocation method for Thai exporter Sahamitr Pressure Container's (SMPC) certification expenses that covered the whole period of review, SMPC said in an April 6 complaint at the Court of International Trade. By doing so, Commerce violated its own practice of using the most detailed transaction-specific expense data and distorted the data, the exporter said (Sahamitr Pressure Container v. U.S., CIT #22-00107).

Arguments from antidumping plaintiffs, led by Wilmar Trading, looking to invoke a recent U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit opinion on whether a particular market situation exists "significantly overstates" the case's relevance, DOJ said in an April 7 reply brief (Wilmar Trading PTE v. United States, CIT Consol. #18-00121).

The government has no cause of action to pursue counterclaims once liquidation is finalized, and the challenge of a denied protest at the Court of International Trade does not reopen the window for reliquidation at higher duty rates, Cyber Power Systems said in an April 5 brief. The brief is in support of a previous motion to dismiss a counterclaim by the government seeking to reclassify its imported cables from China at a higher duty rate (see 2203180042) (Cyber Power Systems (USA) Inc. v. U.S., CIT #21-00200).

Section 232 steel tariffs paid by importer North American Interpipe should be deducted from its U.S. price in an antidumping proceeding, the importer, along with its Ukrainian manufacturer, argued in an April 6 complaint at the Court of International Trade. Taking a novel approach to this position -- which has been routinely defeated at CIT -- Interpipe said the national security tariffs should be deducted due to their tentative nature given that a number of exclusion requests were retroactively granted in a separate CIT case challenging the exclusion denials (Interpipe Ukraine v. U.S., CIT #22-00066).

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit signaled during an April 6 oral argument that whether a country is a non-market economy would not stand as a criterion in determining whether to grant an import first sale valuation. Responding to arguments from John Peterson, counsel for importer and plaintiff Meyer Corp. and Beverly Farrell of DOJ, three Federal Circuit judges -- Judge Todd Hughes in particular -- said that it was unlikely the government would succeed in defending the use of this criterion in customs law, as non-market economy principle is reserved for trade remedy laws (Meyer Corp. v. United States, Fed. Cir. #21-1932).

Domestic U.S. cut-to-length carbon steel plate (CTL plate) producer SSAB Enterprises should not be allowed to intervene in exporter Dongkuk Steel Mill Co.'s countervailing duty challenge, the exporter told the Court of International Trade in an April 5 brief. Since SSAB did not submit any factual information or written arguments to the Commerce Department during the relevant CVD proceeding, SSAB is not an "interested party" with standing to intervene in the case, Dongkuk said (Dongkuk Steel Mill Co. v. United States, CIT #22-00032).

The Commerce Department improperly applied adverse facts available to antidumping duty adminstrative review respondent Xinjiang Meihua Amino Acid Co. since the agency failed to notify the respondent that there was a deficiency in its responses, Meihua said in an April 6 complaint at the Court of International Trade. As a result of using AFA, Commerce hit Meihua with a 154.07% dumping margin -- a rate dubbed "draconian" by the plaintiffs (Meihua Group International Trading (Hong Kong) Limited v. United States, CIT #22-00069).

The Commerce Department's finding that two EU agriculture subsidies -- the Basic Payment Scheme and sustainable land use (Greening) payments -- are de jure specific is illegal and defies a key past court ruling, exporters Agro Sevilla Aceitunas and Angel Camacho Alimentacion said in an April 6 complaint at the Court of International Trade. Building off a case currently at the trade court in which the court held that these subsidies are not de jure specific, Agro Sevilla and Camacho also challenged Commerce's definitions of "prior stage product" and "latter stage product," among other things (Agro Sevilla Aceitunas S. Coop. v. United States, CIT #22-00106).