Today, the U.S. Department of Commerce (Commerce) announced the final decision in its antidumping and countervailing duty investigations into stainless steel flanges from India, imposing combined antidumping and countervailing duties of approximately 24% to 401.41% on Indian flanges. The decision can be found here.
On August 16, 2017, the Coalition of American Flange Producers, an ad hoc association of U.S. producers of stainless steel flanges, filed petitions with Commerce and the U.S. International Trade Commission alleging that the U.S. stainless steel flange industry had been materially injured by unfairly priced imports from China and India.
Daniel B. Pickard, counsel to the Coalition and partner in the International Trade Practice at Wiley Rein LLP, stated: “The U.S. industry is gratified by Commerce’s final determination, which underscores the extreme, unfair pricing of Indian flanges.”
Mr. Pickard added that today’s resulting duties, while high, do not reflect the final duties that importers will owe on incoming shipments. “Under U.S. law, the antidumping and countervailing duties paid at entry are only estimates,” he said. “The final duty liability for these imports may be higher than these estimates, and will ultimately be determined by Commerce through a post-investigation review process that likely will not conclude until 2020.”
Mr. Pickard noted that U.S. law imposes severe penalties on foreign producers and importers alike that seek to circumvent U.S. trade remedy duties. Purchasers may also be subject to such penalties, if they assist in “introducing” goods into the United States or cooperate with foreign producers and/or importers in circumventing duties. “We expect to vigorously pursue all options as to the unfairly priced imports from India, including potentially retroactively increasing duties through the administrative review process as well as seeking strict enforcement of U.S. anti-circumvention laws,” Mr. Pickard said.
Stainless steel flanges are used as connectors for stainless steel pipes and piping components such as tanks, valves, and pumps. The current investigations cover not only finished Chinese and Indian flanges imported into the United States, but unfinished flanges, and flanges finished in third countries using Chinese or Indian forgings.
SOURCE Wiley Rein LLP
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