Dillinger France S.A. v. United States, 2019 CIT 88

Background

Commerce issued a final antidumping determination on May 15, 2017, assigning Dillinger France a 6.15% margin for certain cut-to-length steel plate imports.
Dillinger reported prices for downstream sales by affiliated service centers but could not identify the manufacturer for some transactions.
Commerce applied partial adverse facts available (AFA) in the Final Determination by (1) attributing unidentified-producer sales to Dillinger and (2) replacing reported prices for those transactions with the "highest non-aberrational net price."
The Court of International Trade upheld most of Commerce's determination but remanded, finding Commerce had not adequately justified replacing reliable record price data with AFA.
On remand Commerce treated the disputed transactions as Dillinger-produced and used the reported sale prices (rather than the highest non-aberrational price), explaining that the reported prices were reliable and had no measurable impact on Dillinger's weighted-average margin.
Nucor challenged the Remand Results as insufficiently adverse and inadequately explained; Dillinger and the Government supported Commerce. The court sustained Commerce's Remand Results.

Issues

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Whether Commerce permissibly applied partial AFA to affiliated service-center sales when the producer was unidentified	Dillinger argued Commerce should not replace reliable recorded prices or otherwise impose additional adverse adjustments beyond attributing sales to Dillinger	Commerce (and the Government) argued partial AFA was permissible to attribute unknown-producer sales to Dillinger but that reported prices could be used when reliable and not in dispute	Court sustained Commerce: attributing sales to Dillinger was appropriate AFA for the missing producer info; using reported prices was justified because prices were reliable and had no effect on margin
Whether Commerce erred by not using the highest non-aberrational net price as the adverse AFA price	Dillinger argued the highest-price substitution was improper because record prices were reliable	Nucor argued Commerce should have used the highest non-aberrational price to better deter noncooperation and effectuate AFA's purpose	Court rejected Nucor: Commerce reasonably balanced inducing compliance and accuracy; substituting an adverse price was unnecessary where reported prices were reliable and did not affect the margin
Whether Commerce adequately explained its remand methodology	Dillinger maintained prior concerns resolved by using reported prices; Commerce provided explanation on remand	Nucor contended the Remand Results lacked sufficient justification that the chosen method effectuated AFA's deterrent purpose	Court found Commerce's remand explanation adequate and consistent with the earlier opinion's directive
Whether the remand change altered Dillinger’s dumping margin	Dillinger argued no change needed; Nucor implied stronger AFA needed to affect margin	Commerce stated remand approach did not change the estimated weighted-average dumping margin	Court noted and accepted that the remand approach did not change Dillinger’s margin

Key Cases Cited

Dillinger France S.A. v. United States, 350 F. Supp. 3d 1349 (Ct. Int’l Trade 2018) (remanding Commerce to justify replacing record prices with AFA)
SolarWorld Americas, Inc. v. United States, 229 F. Supp. 3d 1362 (Ct. Int’l Trade 2017) (AFA selection must balance inducing compliance and accuracy)
F.lli De Cecco di Filippo Fara S. Martino S.p.A. v. United States, 216 F.3d 1027 (Fed. Cir. 2000) (AFA standard; selection must be reasonable to induce cooperation and ensure accuracy)