On November 6, 2014, the United States International Trade Commission (ITC) announced their determination that U.S. industry has been materially injured by imports of non-oriented electric steel (NOES) from six Asian and European countries.  The ITC final injury determination follows a Department Commerce final determination that NOES from China, Germany, Japan, Korea, Sweden, and Taiwan are sold in the United States for less than fair value and are subsidized by the governments of China and Taiwan.  As a result of the ITC affirmative determination, the Department of Commerce will issue antidumping duty orders on imports of NOES from China, Germany, Japan, Korea, Sweden, and Taiwan and countervailing duty orders on imports of NOES from China and Taiwan.  The Commission’s official investigation report will be available December 9, 2014 and can be accessed here.

The antidumping duties assessed to each country are as follows:

Country	Dumping Margins
China	407.52%
Germany	86.29-98.84%
Japan	135.59-204.79%
South Korea	6.88%
Sweden	98.46-126.72%
Taiwan	27.54-52.23%

Furthermore, the Commerce Department will instruct Customs and Border Protection (CBP) to continue to require U.S. importers of NOES from China and Taiwan to deposit countervailing duties.  Current countervailing duties are 158.88% for China and 8.80 to 17.12% for Taiwan.  Thus, the total antidumping and countervailing duties assessed on NOES from China and Taiwan would be 566.4% and 36.34-69.35%, respectively.

The scope of the orders covers NOES that meets the following description: Cold-rolled, flat-rolled, alloy steel product, whether or not in coils, of any width, having an actual thickness of 0.20 mm or more, in which the core loss is substantially the same in any direction of magnetization in the plane of the material. NOES contains by weight more than 1.00 percent but less than 3.5 percent of silicon, not more than 0.08 percent of carbon, and not more than 1.5 percent of aluminum. NOES has a surface oxide coating, to which an insulation coating may be applied. NOES is subject to these investigations whether it is fully processed (i.e., fully annealed to develop final magnetic properties) or semi-processed (i.e., finished to final thickness and physical form but not fully annealed to develop final magnetic properties).

The sole petitioner in this investigation is AK Steel Corp. of West Chester, Ohio.  In 2013, NOES imports from the subject countries totaled $64.1 million and NOES imports from all other countries totaled $5 million.  Due to the unique magnetization properties of NOES, the alloy is primarily used in the production of motors and generators.

If you have questions about this post or the economic impacts of the NOES AD/CVD order, please contact Frohsin & Barger.