(a) ZG has a preliminary de minimis AD margin of 0.04%; suspension of liquidation and AD cash deposits or the posting of a bond will not be required

In its first full week available, New Line Home Entertainment’s The Butterfly Effect was the top-rented DVD in the U.S., Rentrak said its preliminary Home Video Essentials for the week ended July 11 showed. It said the title earned $8.09 million on DVD in the week, for $8.17 million to date. No other new titles made the top 10. Last week’s #1 DVD -- Columbia TriStar’s thriller Secret Window -- dropped to #2 in its 3rd week, earning an additional $5.96 million, for $21.50 million to date.

Flextronics has scheduled its annual shareholders meeting for Sept. 23 in San Jose, it said in a preliminary proxy statement filed at the SEC.

In its 2nd week available, Activision’s Spider-Man 2 for PS2 was again the top-rented videogame in the U.S., Rentrak’s preliminary Home Video Essentials data for the week ended July 11 showed. The title earned an additional $852,488 in the week, for $1.57 million to date. The Xbox version of the game was again #3, earning an additional $435,620, for $824,359 to date. But Atari had the most SKUs in the top 10, with 3: The PS2 version of DRIV3R at #2 again in its 3rd week ($636,226 in the week, $1.61 million to date), DRIV3R for Xbox at #4 again ($333,565 and $909,476) and Shadow Ops: Red Mercury at #9 (down 2 in its 4th week, $180,588 and $649,171). Take-Two Interactive’s Rockstar Games had 2 SKUs in the top 10 again: Red Dead Revolver on PS2 at #5 again in its 10th week, $282,774 and $2.7 million) and the Xbox version at #10 again (10th week, $180,194 and $1.56 million). Electronic Arts, Midway Games and THQ each had one title in the top 10: Respectively, Need for Speed Underground for PS2 at #6 (up 3 in its 34th week, $186,214 and $9.23 million), NBA Ballers for PS2 at #7 (up one in its 14th week, $183,479 and $3.18 million) and Full Spectrum Warrior for Xbox at #8 (up 6 in its 6th week, $183,308 and $669,468).

The International Trade Administration (ITA) has issued its preliminary results of the following antidumping (AD) duty administrative reviews:

new shipper review; bonding will no longer be permitted to fulfill AD security requirements.

(a) final AD cash deposit rate of zero; however, suspension of liquidation will continue

The U.S.’s call termination fee system appears to have generated better results than Europe’s regulatory approach, a preliminary paper presented last week by Scott Marcus found. Marcus, who is with the FCC Office of Strategic Planning & Policy Analysis, has been seconded to the European Commission (EC) since Feb. He stressed his paper -- Call Termination Fees : The U.S. in Global Perspective -- reflects his own opinions as a Transatlantic Fellow of the German Marshall Fund of the U.S., rather than those of the FCC or the EC. U.S. call termination rates tend to be symmetric and low, Marcus said, because the intercarrier compensation regime for local calls creates a presumption that local termination rates will be symmetric and based on the forward-looking costs of the incumbent wireline operators. Termination rates for local calls between wireless operators and between nonincumbent wireline companies aren’t regulated and are usually zero, he said. The trend toward zero marginal cost for domestic calls has prompted a migration to zero marginal retail price -- with wireless and now wireline operators offering “buckets of minutes” plans with no roaming or long distance charges. On the other hand, he said, Europe has high and asymmetric call termination fees, forcing fixed users to provide “large and arguably irrational subsidies” to mobile users. Pricier and unequal fees also contribute to European mobile average prices per min. of use (MoU) nearly twice comparable U.S. prices, though also low initial costs for mobile services, Marcus said. He said the differences in usage and price per MoU couldn’t be ascribed only to the U.S. regime in which cellular subscribers pay to receive calls. The paper examines the U.S. mobile market in the global context. Differences between the U.S. and Europe are most dramatic in that market, Marcus said. The European system has spurred faster adoption of mobile telephony while also depressing use of the phones. On the other hand, Marcus said, the U.S. system has meant slower uptake of mobile telephony but much higher usage of mobile phones. In a section on next steps for the European Union and the U.S., Marcus said the EC’s new regulatory framework for e- communications, which addresses call termination fees by listing markets potentially subject to ex ante regulation, is a logical approach. However, he said, it could lead to heavier-handed regulation unless European regulators authorities reduce regulatory asymmetries. While the U.S.’s call termination system isn’t creating a mobile termination problem, he said, intercarrier compensation regimes are “under significant stress due to increasing competition, differences in the prices of different forms of access, and technological and market convergence.” IP telephony is placing new strains on the system as well, he said. Both schemes will continue to face stress in the coming years, Marcus said, as Europe moves to more intensive regulation and the U.S. continues on its “generally regulatory trajectory.” The paper isn’t a “chest-thumping endorsement” of U.S. regulatory policy, he said, but the U.S. system seems to be working better than Europe’s -- “perhaps as much through dumb luck as through regulatory genius.”

The International Trade Administration (ITA) has issued a notice stating that, at the request of the petitioners, it is postponing the preliminary antidumping (AD) duty determinations on certain tissue paper products and certain crepe paper products from China until no later than August 25, 2004 (from July 26, 2004).

The European Union’s (EU) new e-communications regulatory system seems to be working well, but it continues to face challenges, according to a preliminary paper presented last week by Scott Marcus from the FCC’s Office of Strategic Planning & Policy Analysis. Marcus has been informally seconded to the European Commission (EC) since Feb. His paper -- Europe’s New Regulatory Framework [NRF] for Electronic Communications in Action -- reflects his own opinions as a Transatlantic Fellow of the German Marshall Fund of the U.S., and not those of the FCC or EC, he said. The NRF has been in effect since July 2003, though not all EU member states have imported it into national law. Despite that, Marcus said, the NRF’s core elements appear to function as intended. The “new and elegant” system recognizes that a great deal of telecom regulation deals with responses to market power, Marcus said. It defines a relevant set of e- communications markets and provides guidelines for determining the presence or absence of market power. Within each market national regulatory authorities in member states determine whether any players have significant market power (SMP). If they do, NRAs impose “ex ante” obligations that can include transparency, interconnection or other conditions. If no SMP is found, any such obligations already in place must be rolled back. The NRF seeks to move away from technology-specific and service-specific legislation, Marcus said: “This is a significant and dramatic innovation.” Nevertheless, he said, there are concerns. Implementation of the system is still a work in progress, with some countries, such as the U.K., far along and others at various earlier stages. Implementation involves detailed market analyses by expert economists, and could later barrage the EC with paperwork as countries notify the EC of their progress on each relevant e-communications market, Marcus sad. He added the NRF seeks to balance the needs of NRAs against those of a single European market and the EC’s prerogatives in maintaining that market. But a “key open question” has been whether the Commission and national telecom regulators could strike that balance. “In particular,” Marcus said, “there seemed to be a real danger that centrifugal forces might prevail, thereby preventing the European Union from achieving the true benefits of a single market.” The European Competitive Telecom Assn. recently reported “very significant differences” in the capability, orientation and conduct among European regulators, Marcus said. The existence of both centrifugal and centripetal forces is undeniable, he said, and the tension hasn’t been fully resolved. However, he said, 2 developments bode well for the future. The European Regulators Group agreed on appropriate remedies in the NRF, and the EC has made clear it will use its power to ensure consistent application of the framework. Still, other tensions exist, Marcus said -- the need to spur innovation without distorting competition, and promoting competition vs. encouraging the growth of pan- European networks and interoperability. Finally, he said, “The assessment of termination fees for completing a call is a complex area that represents a distinct risk as regards NRF implementation.” The EC has addressed the problem of uneven fixed and mobile call termination rates by identifying 18 potential markets where ex ante regulation might be necessary, he said. That’s a logical approach, Marcus said, but it will tend to lead to heavy regulation. It’s essential that NRAs “stay the course in order to reduce regulatory asymmetries,” he said.