CIT Sustains Affirmative Injury Finding on OCTG From Argentina, Mexico, Russia, South Korea

Two groups of plaintiffs, led by Tenaris Bay City and TMK Group, challenged various aspects of the injury determination, many of which were previously remanded by the trade court (see 2404220036).

The remanded issues include the decision to cumulate Russian imports with the imports from the other three nations. Choe-Groves said the commission failed to account for sanctions on Russia and the loss of American Petroleum Institute (API) certification for Russian imports in assessing whether Russian OCTG should be cumulated with the other countries' products.

On remand, the ITC said the suspension of API certification didn't render Russian products "non-fungible with domestic and imported OCTG," since it didn't bar Russian green tube from competing with domestic or imported green tube, given that the quality of Russian OCTG remained competitive despite lacking certification. Choe-Groves held that the commission properly considered contrary evidence, including the testimony of Tenaris' president, ultimately concluding that the president's views don't reflect the "actual views of domestic and global purchasers on this issue."

The ITC properly used other evidence, including U.S. purchasers' questionnaire responses regarding the ability of Russian OCTG to meet minimum quality specifications, the court said.

Regarding the effect of U.S. sanctions, the ITC said the sanctions didn't prevent Russian OCTG from appearing in the U.S. market during the investigation period, including a two-month period in this range that occurred after Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Choe-Groves held that the ITC ultimately provided enough evidence showing sufficient important quantity of Russian OCTG during this period to indicate that the goods could be cumulated with other imports.

The court also discussed whether the statute compels the ITC to consider the conditions of competition of Russian OCTG on vote day or throughout the investigation period in its cumulation analysis. Engaging in an exercise of statutory interpretation, Choe-Groves said the applicable statute, 19 U.S.C. 1677(7)(G)(i) is "silent as to the precise time period that the commission must consider in making its cumulation determination."

The judge said the "conditions of competition must exist in the present tense at the end of the investigation," though it's not enough that the conditions of competition existed "at some point during the period of investigation." As a result, Choe-Groves held that "subject imports from competing countries must be evaluated under similar circumstances and in the present tense at the end of the investigation." The judge then said that, in this proceeding, there was a lack of statutory support for the claim that the ITC needed to "weigh the conditions of competition more heavily at the end of the period of investigation due to the sanctions imposed against Russia," sustaining the commission's focus instead on the competition throughout the 42-month investigation period.

Tenaris also challenged the cumulation of South Korea's products with the imports from the other nations. Previously, Choe-Groves sent back this cumulation decision, finding that the ITC improperly cumluated subject and non-subject Korean products and that the commission didn't address the possible effect from subjecting Korean imports to an existing antidumping duty order.

On remand, the ITC removed import data from exporter Hyundai in an effort to remove non-subject Korean imports from its analysis. The commission said this move removed "from the pool of responses impressions of purchasers who may have had Hyundai’s OCTG in mind when furnishing responses on interchangeability, comparability, and the importance of non-price factors." Choe-Groves upheld the move as reasonable.

Regarding the impact of the existing AD order, the ITC said the AD order wouldn't address injury resulting from unlawful subsidization of the covered imports and is only capable of "discipling the level of dumping not the level of subsidization." Choe-Groves held that this explanation, along with the agency's standard cumulation analysis of Korean imports, was adequate.

Tenaris additionally argued that import volumes weren't significant under the conditions of competition, given that U.S. producers couldn't supply surging demand in 2021 following a historic demand collapse. The importer added that the ITC failed to consider the post-petition increase in the volume of subject imports, adding that consideration of "volume" should be limited to absolute volume. Choe-Groves held that the statute doesn't require the ITC to consider "conditions of competition" in its analysis of volume, nor does it restrict consideration of volume to "absolute volume," as argued by Tenaris.

Regarding the imports' price effects, Tenaris urged the ITC to adopt an alternative price comparison methodology, which would lag by one quarter its comparisons of import prices with domestic prices. Choe-Groves said four pieces of evidence support the ITC's decision not to apply an alternative methodology, including the fact that the basis for the proposed adjustments "would largely be limited to subject imports from Argentina and Mexico."

Tenaris also argued that the ITC failed to make a price suppression finding and that it ignored evidence when finding that domestic producers lost sales to subject imports based on price. Choe-Groves held that there's no such requirement that the commission make a price suppression finding for its price effects determination, and that the commission "considered the evidence of lost sales and reasonably determined the adverse price effect of the subject OCTG."

Lastly, Tenaris made a pair of claims against the ITC's impact determination, arguing that the commission failed to evaluate the impact of imports within the "context of conditions distinctive to the U.S. OCTG industry, as required by statute," and "erroneously attributed the positive health of the industry in interim 2021 to post-petition effects" rather than other evidence, including changing market conditions.

Regarding the context of conditions in the U.S. industry, Tenaris said the ITC failed to address the "Russia/Saudi oil supply war and de-emphasized COVID-19 in assessing the impact of subject imports," ignored evidence of supply constraints and errantly only considered inventories in supply constraint. Choe-Groves said the commission's determination was reasonably supported by substantial evidence, holding that the ITC "reasonably relied on witness testimony, rather than 'self-serving' statements to make its determination."

As for evidence of the domestic industry's recovery, the judge said the ITC didn't "fail to fully consider the evidence of the domestic industry’s recovery." The commission considered 2021 trends and said the industry's "production, employment, and financial performance remained weaker in 2021 than would have been expected in light of the strong increase in demand."

(Tenaris Bay City v. United States, Slip Op. 25-78, CIT Consol. # 22-00344, dated 06/20/25; Judge: Jennifer Choe-Groves; Attorneys: Gregory Spak of White & Case for plaintiffs led by Tenaris Bay City; Michael Chapman of Winton & Chapman for consolidated plaintiff TMK Group; Dominic Bianchi for defendant U.S. government; Thomas Beline of Cassidy Levy for defendant-intervenor U.S. Steel Corp.; Roger Schagrin of Schagrin Associates for defendant-intervenors led by Borusan Mannesmann Pipe U.S. Inc.)