Editors note: Commerce Department decision is likely to put fines up to 450 percent on steel from China transshipped through Vietnam.
The Commerce Department has issued steep final duties on imports of certain cold-rolled steel products from Vietnam that are produced with Chinese material, determining that Vietnamese exporters have been circumventing existing antidumping and countervailing duty orders imposed by the U.S.
[May 18, 2018 | Inside U.S. Trade]
Commerce has yet to issue details on the ruling, but a DC-based law firm and other sources say it will soon announce duties of roughly 240 percent and 450 percent on imports of Vietnamese corrosion-resistant (CORE) and cold-rolled steel (CRS), respectively, for products that use material produced in China.
The duties will be applied retroactively to Nov. 4, 2016, the date Commerce initiated the circumvention proceedings, according to a May 18 statement from the law firm Wiley Rein. CORE and CRS products manufactured in Vietnam using substrate that is not of Chinese origin are not subject to them.
In September 2016, a group of domestic steel producers filed anti-circumvention petitions with the Commerce Department alleging that U.S. imports of CORE and CRS from Vietnam, which used Chinese steel inputs, were entering the U.S. duty-free, despite AD and CVD orders placed on such products from China in July 2016. The petitions were filed by Steel Dynamics, Inc., California Steel Industries, AK Steel Corporation, Arcelor Mittal USA, Nucor Corporation and U.S. Steel.
“While U.S. imports of Chinese CORE and cold-rolled steel declined as a result [of the July 2016 duties], imports of CORE and cold-rolled steel from Vietnam skyrocketed,” Wiley Rein said….
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