Today, the US Department of Commerce (DOC) announced the initiation of new antidumping duty (AD) and countervailing duty (CVD) investigations to determine whether certain collated steel staples from China, Korea, and Taiwan are being dumped in the United States and to determine if producers in China are receiving unfair subsidies.
These antidumping and countervailing duty investigations were initiated based on petitions filed by Kyocera Senco Industrial Tools, Inc. (Cincinnati, Ohio).
The alleged dumping margins are:
• China – 119.37 to 122.55 percent
• Korea – 10.23 to 14.25 percent
• Taiwan – 47.60 percent
There are 27 subsidy programs alleged for China, including five preferential loan and interest rate programs, two export credit programs, five income tax and other direct subsidy programs, four indirect tax programs, six grant programs, and five less than adequate remuneration programs.
If the DOC makes affirmative findings in these investigations, and if the US International Trade Commission (ITC) determines that dumped and/or unfairly subsidized US imports of collated staples from China, Korea, and Taiwan are causing injury to the US industry, Commerce will impose duties on those imports in the amount of dumping and/or unfair subsidization found to exist.
In 2018, imports of collated staples from China, Korea, and Taiwan were valued at an estimated $88.8 million, $6.9 million, and $5.1 million, respectively.
The ITC will make its preliminary determinations on or before July 22, 2019. If the ITC preliminarily determines that there is injury or threat of injury, then Commerce’s investigations will continue, with the preliminary CVD determination scheduled for August 30, 2019, and preliminary AD determinations scheduled for November 13, 2019, unless these deadlines are extended.
Final determinations by the DOC in these cases are scheduled for November 13, 2019 for the CVD investigation, and January 27, 2020 for the AD investigation, but these dates may be extended.