The Court of International Trade on Oct. 20 sustained the Commerce Department's decision on remand to exclude importer Elysium Tiles' composite tile from the scope of the antidumping duty and countervailing duty orders on ceramic tile from China. After being told by the court to consider the (k)(2) scope factors, Commerce flipped its scope finding on Elysium's tile to exclude the company's products from the orders. Judge Jane Restani reviewed the agency's (k)(2) analysis and found that while for three of them, the products' ultimate uses, channels of trade and means of advertisement, favored including the composite tile in the orders' scope, these factors are outweighed by the differences in the products' physical characteristics and user expectations.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on Oct. 15 affirmed the validity of the International Trade Commission's affirmative critical circumstances determination on imports of raw honey from Vietnam, which imposed retroactive antidumping duties on the subject goods in the 90-day window prior to the AD investigation's preliminary determination. Judges Richard Taranto, Alan Lourie and Tiffany Cunningham rejected the claim from a group of honey importers that the ITC was required to find that a surge of imports made after the filing of the AD petition had an adverse impact after the final AD order was issued. Writing for the court, Taranto said the relevant statute, 19 U.S.C. Section 1673d(b)(4)(A)(i), "does not demand a determination focused on the time after the antidumping duty order issues."

The Court of International Trade on Oct. 10 sustained the Commerce Department's decision not to treat interest accrued on respondent Koehler Paper's unpaid antidumping duties as an indirect selling expense in the 2021-22 AD review of thermal paper from Germany. Judge Gary Katzmann said interest accrued on sales made prior to the review period doesn't qualify for either the statutory or regulatory definition of an indirect selling expense, since the interest doesn't relate to the sale of "subject merchandise," namely merchandise sold during the review period. The judge added that a prior CIT decision upholding the treatment of interest on AD duties as an indirect selling expense didn't directly consider whether such interest met the statutory or regulatory definition of an indirect selling expense.

The Court of International Trade on Oct. 9 sustained the Commerce Department's 2021-22 review of the antidumping duty order on utility-scale wind towers from Malaysia. Judge Gary Katzmann held that Commerce permissibly decided not to apply an adjustment to the cost of production to "account for production volume decreases before a shutdown" and selected Malaysian companies Mycron Steel and Alpine Pipe Manufacturing as the surrogate companies for calculating respondent CS Wind's constructed value profit. Regarding the cost of production adjustment, Katzmann noted that the agency properly captured the shutdown-related costs in a separate variable submitted by CS Wind.

The Court of International Trade on Oct. 9 sustained the Commerce Department's decision, made on remand, to exclude seven types of magnesia carbon bricks imported by Fedmet Resources from the scope of the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on magnesia carbon bricks from China. While the petitioner, the Magnesia Carbon Bricks Fair Trade Committee, argued that Judge Miller Baker previously misinterpreted a 2014 ruling from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in finding that the addition of any alumina to the bricks excludes them from the orders, Baker was unconvinced. The judge said the petitioner in the underlying AD/CVD investigations explicitly disclaimed the inclusion of bricks with any alumina within the scope of the orders. Baker noted that while this could allow importers to skirt duty liability by merely adding tiny amounts of alumina, affected U.S. producers could turn to anti-circumvention proceedings.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on Oct. 8 affirmed the Court of International Trade's rejection of the Commerce Department's application of its "cross-ownership regulation" to countervailing duty respondent Gujarat Fluorochemicals in the CVD investigation of polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) resin from India. In the investigation, Commerce attributed a subsidy received by Inox Wind to Gujarat, since Inox sold the respondent wind power that constituted only 1.03% of total power consumed by the company.

The Court of International Trade on Oct. 8 remanded a Commerce Department scope ruling that importer Pitts Enterprises' chassis from Vietnam containing Chinese-origin axle and landing gear components fall under the scope of the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on chassis and subassemblies thereof from China. Judge Claire Kelly held that Commerce must adopt the "plain meaning of the word 'entered'" in the AD/CVD orders, "namely 'entered into the United States.'" Kelly also rejected the agency's claim that the plain meaning of the orders covers Chinese-origin parts that enter the U.S. as part of a chassis. She found that the orders are ambiguous as to "when components are included within the scope of the Orders." They're also unclear on when third country operations remove these parts from the orders, as well as on the meaning of "subassemblies ... whether ... assembled or unassembled." Lastly, the judge told Commerce to reconsider its decision to impose AD/CVD on the "entire value of the imported chassis" rather than just on the Chinese-origin parts.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on Oct. 6 sent back the Commerce Department's antidumping duty investigation on carbon and alloy steel cut-length-plate from Germany. Judges Alan Lourie, Timothy Dyk and Jimmie Reyna upheld Commerce's rejection of respondent AG der Dillinger Huttenwerke's proposed adjustments to the agency's model-match methodology, though the judges said it was "unreasonable for Commerce to use likely selling price as facts otherwise available for cost of production." The court stressed that "when there is a gap to fill" in the record, "there must be a reasonable relationship between the selected facts otherwise available and the gap to be filled."

The Court of International on Oct. 6 sustained the Commerce Department's 2023 review of the countervailing duty order on steel concrete reinforcing bar from Turkey. Following a remand on the agency's de jure specificity finding of an exemption from Turkey's Banking and Insurance Transactions Tax on foreign exchange transactions and its selection of a report from Colliers international to use as the benchmark to value rent-free lease of land to respondent Kaptan's affiliate, Judge Gary Katzmann upheld Commerce's decisions not to countervail the tax exemption but to stick with the Colliers report. Regarding the specificity determination, Katzmann said he already rejected the claims that the tax exemption was de jure specific, adding that the agency operated within its discretion in not engaging in more of a de facto specificity investigation or using adverse facts available given the Turkish government's failure to provide requested information on remand.

The Commerce Department adequately supported its decision to find that antidumping respondent Compania Valencia de Aluminio Baux and its affiliate, Bancolor Baux, only sold common alloy aluminum sheet in one level of trade in its home market of Spain, the Court of International Trade held on Sept. 25. Judge Mark Barnett said the relevant AD statute doesn't require Commerce to "recognize a distinct level of trade in connection with any differences in selling activities," finding the agency's level of trade regulations to comply with the AD laws.