The Court of International Trade granted an indefinite injunction against the liquidation of Moroccan exporter OCP S.A.'s phosphate fertilizers in an Oct. 4 order. The key issue before the court over the injunction was its length. The U.S., while agreeing to the injunction in principle, thought the injunction should only run to the end of the first administrative review of the countervailing duty order on the fertilizers -- a review that had yet to commence. OCP pushed for an indefinite injunction against liquidation. The court sided with OCP, finding that the exporter has sufficiently showed that it will suffer irreparable harm if the court enters an injunction that doesn't extend to entries affected by this litigation and occurring after the end of the 2021 calendar year -- the date at which automatic liquidation would begin.

The Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit held in an Oct. 4 opinion that the Commerce Department properly applied adverse facts available to Hyundai Electric & Energy Systems in an antidumping review on large power transformers from South Korea. In the review, Hyundai said it shifted costs among LPT projects in the ordinary course of business to show that each project was profitable. Commerce requested information on this cost shifting from Hyundai, who broke down the cost differences by LPT project for reconciliation into six categories. Commerce deemed that Hyundai only gave sufficient information on one of these categories. The Court of International Trade had also found Commerce's resulting application of AFA to be appropriate.

The Court of International Trade sustained the Commerce Department's remand results in the 13th administrative review of the antidumping duty order on fish fillets from Vietnam in a Sept. 27 order. In the review, Commerce applied total adverse facts available to the mandatory respondents, leading to a $3.87/kg dumping margin which the court upheld in a previous decision. Commerce also extended this rate to the non-individually reviewed "separate rate" respondents, which the court remanded. Under protest, Commerce set the separate rate by averaging the separate rates from the previous four administrative reviews, which the court ultimately sustained.

The Court of International Trade remanded an antidumping case to the Commerce Department for a fourth time, finding that the agency's method for finding an all-others dumping rate was unreasonable. The court issued the opinion in a case over the AD duty investigation of hardwood plywood products from China in which the agency assigned the two mandatory respondents a zero percent and 114.72% adverse facts available rate. When finding the all-others rate, Commerce then departed from the expected method -- a move upheld by the court -- and averaged the two rates to get to a 57.36% all-others rate. CIT said rate was based on only one commercial invoice from the AD petition and not reasonably reflective of the all-other respondents' dumping margins.

The Court of International Trade sustained in part and remanded in part the Commerce Department's second remand results in a case over the antidumping duty administrative review of passenger vehicle and light truck tires from China in a Sept. 24 order. Judge Jennifer Choe-Groves found that Commerce's denial of separate rate status to Pirelli Tyre Co. during the first ten months of the review period was unreasonable, because the company was not Chinese government-controlled for that part of the period of review. Choe-Groves also sustained Commerce's decision to drop a downward adjustment for irrecoverable value-added tax to mandatory respondent Qingdao Sentury Tire Co.'s export price.

The Court of International Trade sustained the Commerce Department's final results in the antidumping duty investigation of certain quartz surface products from China, in Sept. 24 opinion. Judge Leo Gordon upheld Commerce's selection of Mexico as the primary surrogate country over Malaysia for the purposes of calculating normal value. Seeing as the plaintiffs needed to prove that Malaysia was the "one and only reasonable surrogate country selection" in order for the court to justify the switch, Gordon ruled in favor of Commerce since the plaintiffs failed to make this demonstration, the opinion said.

The Court of International Trade remanded the Commerce Department's final results in an antidumping duty administrative review that made a particular market situation adjustment to the cost of production in a sales-below-cost test in a Sept. 23 order. Judge Gary Katzmann said that the statute does not permit PMS adjustment to sales-below-cost tests when calculating normal value. The ruling came in a case brought by mandatory respondents HiSteel and Kukje, which challenged an administrative review of the antidumping duty order on heavy walled rectangular welded carbon steel pipes and tubes from South Korea.

The Court of International Trade sustained the Commerce Department's final results in a changed circumstances review on Argentine biodiesel, finding that the situation hadn't changed regarding countervailable subsidies for Argentina's biodiesel industry. Commerce based the underlying CVD order on an export tax differential between Argentine biodiesel and soybeans. The Argentine government then petitioned for a CCR, arguing that the rates were now equal. In the preliminary results of the CCR, Commerce held that the tax differential had in fact changed, slashing the CVD rate for biodiesel. After new evidence was given to the agency, Commerce found the biodiesel subsidy situation to be in "flux," eventually maintaining the original CVD rate.

The Court of International Trade granted the Commerce Department's motion to lift a stay and voluntarily remand an antidumping duty challenge to give the agency a chance to consider new information showing inaccuracies in the mandatory respondent's reported sales prices. Pirelli Tyre Co., who received the all-others rate in the 2017-18 administrative review of the antidumping duty order on passenger vehicle and light truck tires from China. Commerce said the inaccuracies are based on potential fraud.

The Court of International Trade denied importer Strategic Import Supply's motion for a reconsideration of its case over the proper countervailing duty rate for its tire imports in a Sept. 20 order. Finding that Strategic Import Supply didn't file a timely protest of CBP's decision to liquidate the imports of passenger vehicle and light truck tires from China, Judge Stephen Vaden again dismissed the case for lack of jurisdiction. Strategic Import Supply sought reconsideration after CBP granted a nearly identical protest to the one subject to Vaden's previous dismissal.