CIT Sustains Remand Results With Higher AD Margin for Indian Steel, Boots Proposed Intervenor

The Court of International Trade sustained the Commerce Department's remand results that, unprompted by court order, raised the antidumping rate for Indian steel exporter Venus Wire Industries, in a June 2 opinion. Though Judge Mark Barnett had in November only ordered Commerce to further explain its use of partial AFA in the underlying review, Commerce also changed its calculations to raise the AD rate on Venus for its stainless steel bar exports from India from 5.35% to 24.6%.

To arrive at the higher rate, Commerce continued to rely on partial AFA and made three key adjustments. The agency included some of Venus' U.S. sales that it left out in the final results of the AD case, considered manufacturer codes when comparing U.S. home market and cost databases, and applied partial AFA to other components of Venuses' costs, including variable cost of manufacture and fixed and variable overhead. Venus contested Commerce's remand results on three grounds: that (1) Commerce exceeded the scope of its own voluntary remand request, (2) the agency only ever meant to establish a "higher, punitive margin," and (3) a second remand was necessary so that Commerce could consider the court's opinion in a purportedly related case, Venus Wire Indus. Pvt. Ltd. v. United States. Barnett rejected all three claims, upholding Commerce's redetermination.

On the question of the scope of the remand order, Barnett invoked CIT precedent to find that “[u]nless specifically directed by the court, Commerce has broad discretion to fully consider the issues remanded.” Since the remand order was written in "broad language" and made changes directly related to Commerce's application of the partial AFA methodology, the agency's changes stood up to scrutiny. Barnett also ruled that the higher AD rate is not punitive since "as an initial matter, Venus does not explain why it considers that the corrections at issue were unlawfully punitive, inappropriate or unreasonable." Further, Barnett did not fault Commerce for not considering the Venus Wirecase since it had not been decided yet when the final results were released.

Barnett also rejected a bid from Laxcon Steel Limited -- a producer of the subject merchandise that contested the all-others rate -- to join the litigation as a defendant-intervenor. Given Laxcon's late filing and lack of participation in the underlying proceedings, the court found Laxcon lacked standing.

(Carpenter Technology Corporation, et al. v. United States , Slip Op. 21-68, CIT Consol. # 19-00200, dated 06/02/21, Judge Barnett. Attorneys: Grace Kim of Kelley Drye for plaintiff Carpenter Technology Corporation; Kara Westercamp for defendant U.S. government; Eric Emerson of Steptoe & Johnson for defendant-intervenor Venus Wire Industries Pvt. Ltd.; Peter Koenig of Squire Patton for proposed defendant-intervenor Laxcon Steels Limited)