The International Trade Administration (ITA) has issued the final results of its administrative review of the countervailing (CV) duty order on certain pasta from Italy for the review period of January 1, 2002 through December 31, 2002.

The lack of a formal Q&A at IRMA’s Management Summit Mon. in N.Y.C. precluded discussion about the DualDisc playability issues that have spurred some 10 CE companies to issue consumer advisories warning against use of the DVD/CD hybrid. However, the DualDisc presenter at the conference, John Trickett, CEO of independent label 5.1 Entertainment, later told Consumer Electronics Daily the DualDisc labels took the CE concerns to heart, and that a dialog has been established to address the playability issues. Trickett had used his IRMA presentation to tout DualDisc’s success in its early going, saying that after just a month on the market, DualDisc sales have surpassed those of DVD-Audio’s cumulative sell-through after more than 3 years.

The International Trade Administration (ITA) has issued the preliminary results of its antidumping (AD) duty changed circumstances review of Sebacic Acid from China. The ITA has preliminarily determined that Tianjin has resumed dumping of sebacic acid produced by Hengshui during the July 1, 2002 through June 30, 2003 period of review, as alleged by a domestic interested party.

The U.S. Association of Importers of Textiles and Apparel (USA-ITA) has issued a Textile Development Memo announcing that the U.S. Court of International Trade (CIT) will hold a hearing on December 20, 2004 on the USA-ITA's motion for a preliminary injunction to prevent the Government from taking further action on any of the pending China textile safeguard petitions. (TDM, dated 12/06/04, www.usaita.com)

The World Customs Organization (WCO) has issued an amending supplement (No. 5, dated February 2004) to the Harmonized System (HS) Explanatory Notes (ENs). (Although not binding by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), the ENs are followed by CBP whenever possible.)

The International Trade Administration (ITA) has initiated a new shipper review for the antidumping (AD) duty order on brake rotors from China with respect to the following companies (each of which is a producer and exporter of subject merchandise from China) and review period:

The International Trade Administration (ITA) has made a final determination of sales at less than fair value and an affirmative final determination of critical circumstances for certain crepe paper products from China.

In its 5th week available, Take-Two Interactive’s PS2 game Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas was again the top- rented videogame in the U.S., according to Rentrak’s preliminary Home Video Essentials data for the week ended Nov. 28. Rentrak said the game earned an additional $1.25 million in the week, for a total of $5.77 million to date. Microsoft’s Xbox game Halo 2 was again #2, in its 3rd week, earning an additional $730,441, for $2.3 million to date. Electronic Arts had 2 SKUs in the top 10, but it wasn’t clear at our deadline if they were the PS2 and Xbox versions of the first Need For Speed: Underground or the recently released Need For Speed: Underground 2. Activision had the most SKUs in the top 10, with 3: Call of Duty: Finest Hour at #4 (up 8 in its 2nd week, $329,294 and $463,020), the Xbox version at #9 (up 15, $252,506 and $339,005) and Tony Hawk’s Underground 2 for PS2 at #10 (down 5, 8th week, $246,227 and $2.2 million). Rounding out the top 10 were 3 games on PS2: Konami’s Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater at #5 (up 28, 4th week, $278,717 and $353,448), THQ’s WWE Smackdown! Vs. Raw at #7 (down 3, 4th week, $264,283 and $991,645) and Atari’s Dragon Ball Z: Budokai 3 at #8 in its first week ($259,565).

In its 2nd week available, New Line Home Entertainment’s Elf was once again the #1-rented DVD in the U.S., according to Rentrak’s preliminary Home Video Essentials data for the week ended Nov. 28. Rentrak said the movie earned an additional $11.11 million on DVD, for a total of $21.69 million to date. In its first week available, Warner’s Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban was surprisingly only the #3-rented DVD in the week, trailing Steven Spielberg’s comedy The Terminal from DreamWorks at #2, also in its first week. Rentrak said The Terminal earned $8.98 million on DVD vs. $7.91 million for the latest Harry Potter release.

The International Trade Administration (ITA) frequently issues notices on antidumping (AD) and countervailing (CV) duty orders which Broker Power considers to be "minor" in importance as they concern actions that occur after an order is issued and neither announce nor cause any changes to an order's duty rates, scope, affected firms, or effective period.