Nan Ya Plastics Corp. v. United States
2014 Ct. Intl. Trade LEXIS 94
Ct. Intl. Trade2014Background
- Commerce conducted an administrative review of antidumping duties on PET film from Taiwan; Nan Ya failed to cooperate and Commerce assigned a total adverse facts available (AFA) rate.
- Commerce initially used Nan Ya’s prior high transaction margins for a 99.31% preliminary AFA, then selected a 74.34% AFA in the final results based on the highest transaction-specific margin of cooperating respondent Shinkong, finding Nan Ya’s prior data corroborative.
- Nan Ya sued, arguing the 74.34% rate was an aberrant outlier and that Commerce should have applied de Cecco corroboration standards or otherwise chosen a less extreme proxy.
- The Court remanded for Commerce to address Nan Ya’s statistical and corroboration arguments in the first instance.
- On remand Commerce reaffirmed the 74.34% rate, argued §1677e(c) corroboration does not apply to information obtained in the current review, but nonetheless compared Shinkong’s margin to Nan Ya’s prior transaction data.
- The Court sustained the remand results, finding Nan Ya failed to rebut Commerce’s corroboration (particularly by not statistically analyzing Nan Ya’s own prior transactions that Commerce relied on).
Issues
| Issue | Plaintiff's Argument | Defendant's Argument | Held |
|---|---|---|---|
| Legality of using cooperating respondent’s current-review data without corroboration | Nan Ya: Commerce must treat Shinkong’s margin as secondary and apply §1677e(c)/de Cecco corroboration | U.S.: Shinkong’s data were obtained in the current review, so §1677e(c) corroboration requirement does not apply | Court: Agrees §1677e(c) not required under Chevron step 1 for data obtained in the review, but applies de Cecco-like reasonableness review because Commerce nonetheless tied the rate to Nan Ya’s own data |
| Whether 74.34% AFA rate is an aberrational/outlier proxy | Nan Ya: 74.34% is an outlier — statistical tests (gap test, IQR, SD) show aberrancy; transaction atypical and small portion of sales | Commerce: Shinkong’s transaction not aberrational; Nan Ya’s own prior transactions show margins at or above 74.34%, supporting reasonableness | Court: Sustained Commerce — Nan Ya failed to apply stats to the combined dataset (Shinkong + Nan Ya) that Commerce relied on, so did not meet burden to show unreasonableness |
| Applicability of de Cecco standard to AFA selection here | Nan Ya: de Cecco corroboration/constraints should apply to prevent punitive, uncorroborated margins | U.S.: de Cecco inapplicable because selected rate came from current-review data (not “secondary”) | Court: Although §1677e(c) not strictly triggered, Commerce effectively applied corroboration by comparing to Nan Ya’s historical transactions; court applied de Cecco reasonableness inquiry and found Commerce’s approach reasonable |
| Burden of proof on challenger | Nan Ya: Commerce’s selection unreasonable; challenged with statistics | U.S.: Decision presumed correct; plaintiff must show unreasonableness with the whole record | Court: Nan Ya bore the burden and failed to analyze or rebut the corroborating Nan Ya data; burden not met, so AFA stands |
Key Cases Cited
- Nippon Steel Corp. v. United States, 458 F.3d 1345 (Fed. Cir.) (standard for substantial evidence review)
- DuPont Teijin Films USA v. United States, 407 F.3d 1211 (Fed. Cir.) (definition of substantial evidence)
- Consol. Edison Co. v. NLRB, 305 U.S. 197 (U.S.) (substantial evidence discussion)
- F.LLI de Cecco Di Filippo Fara S. Martino S.p.A. v. United States, 216 F.3d 1027 (Fed. Cir.) (limits on AFA selection; corroboration requirement and deterrence objective)
- Timken Co. v. United States, 354 F.3d 1334 (Fed. Cir.) (balancing accuracy and inducement in AFA selection)
- Gallant Ocean (Thailand) Co. v. United States, 602 F.3d 1319 (Fed. Cir.) (AFA rates cannot be unreasonably high or untethered to commercial reality)