Aussie Steel Exporter Backs Commerce's Remand in AD Case Dropping Adverse Facts Available

Australian steel exporter BlueScope Steel, along with its affiliates Australian Iron & Steel and BlueScope Steel Americas, voiced their support for the Commerce Department's remand results in an antidumping duty case at the Court of International Trade. Filing comments at CIT on May 16, BlueScope backed Commerce's position which slashed the antidumping duties for BlueScope from 99.20% to 4.95% after dropping its reliance on adverse facts available based on BlueScope's U.S. sales quantity and value reporting data (BlueScope Steel Ltd. v. United States, CIT #19-00057).

The opinion comes in a case stemming from the first administrative review of the AD order on hot-rolled steel flat products from Australia, covering entries in 2016-17, in which BlueScope served as mandatory respondent. During the review, it was revealed that all of BlueScope's exports -- made through its affiliate Australian Iron & Steel -- went to its U.S. affiliate, which then entered the merchandise and resold it to yet another affiliate, Steelscape, BlueScope's affiliated processor. The only sales in the U.S. to unaffiliated customers were of merchandise further processed by Steelscape.

During the review, Commerce issued Section A supplemental questionnaires to BlueScope and its affiliates on their U.S. home market and third-country market sales. To show this information, BlueScope gave the agency two charts, one showing constructed export price (CEP) sales and entries of subject merchandise, and the other showing the total amount of Steelscape's sales of further processed merchandise and the total quantity of AIS's sales of hot-rolled steel flat products in the U.S. through the affiliated transactions. These charts show an exact match between Steelscape's sales of further processed merchandise to unaffiliated customers and the quantity of CEP sales, the court said.

Nevertheless, Commerce tossed BlueScope's U.S. sales quantity and value reporting, taking issue with the form of the data submitted. The court, though, said that these were invalid grounds on which to establish AFA, sending the case back to Commerce (see 2112080060). On remand, Commerce dropped its reliance on AFA after issuing the exporter a supplemental questionnaire (see 2204150042). BlueScope now urges the trade court to uphold the remand results. Opposition to the remand was voiced by the AD petitioner, U.S. Steel, which filed comments on Commerce's draft remand and is scheduled to make further arguments against the remand in the coming days.