Seah Steel Vina Corporation v. United States, 19-1091

Background

SeAH Steel VINA was a mandatory respondent in Commerce’s antidumping investigation of certain oil country tubular goods (OCTG) from Vietnam; Commerce treated Vietnam as a non‑market economy and used India as the surrogate country.
Commerce’s February 2014 final determination initially used Welspun’s financials, the World Bank Doing Business Report to value brokerage & handling (B&H), and did not deduct a separate inland‑insurance amount from SeAH’s constructed export price; Commerce assigned SeAH a 24.22% dumping margin.
The U.S. Court of International Trade remanded twice; on remand Commerce (1) replaced Welspun with Bhushan Steel for surrogate financial ratios, (2) included an Agro Dutch‑based surrogate for inland insurance, and (3) allocated Doing Business B&H costs by shipment weight — producing a revised 61.04% margin.
The CIT sustained Commerce’s remand redetermination (SeAH III); SeAH appealed to the Federal Circuit challenging (a) the Bhushan financials selection, (b) inclusion/use of an inland‑insurance surrogate, and (c) Commerce’s by‑weight allocation of B&H.
The Federal Circuit affirmed Commerce’s choice of Bhushan and its inclusion of an inland‑insurance surrogate, but reversed Commerce’s B&H allocation by weight as unsupported by substantial evidence, and remanded the case for further proceedings.

Issues

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Surrogate financial ratios (choice of Bhushan)	Use of Bhushan’s financial statements distorted overhead/SG&A and did not yield meaningful OCTG profit; Welspun (or others) was preferable.	Commerce had no superior record option; Bhushan produced identical merchandise and its statements were public and contemporaneous.	Affirmed — Commerce reasonably selected Bhushan as the best available record information.
Inclusion of inland insurance surrogate	Commerce lacked record evidence that SeAH paid inland insurance distinct from freight; using Agro Dutch was improper and denied SeAH process.	SeAH’s freight‑forwarder contract expressly allocated fees for cargo safety; Agro Dutch was the only timely surrogate on the record; Commerce properly accounted for insurance in constructed export price.	Affirmed — substantial evidence supports treating the contract as including inland insurance and using the Agro Dutch surrogate on the record.
B&H allocation methodology (weight‑based)	Doing Business Report does not tie B&H costs to shipment weight; Commerce’s per‑weight conversion produced unreasonable per‑unit B&H values.	Record shows some Indian B&H charges can be weight‑based; Commerce acted within discretion to convert surrogate to per‑kg.	Reversed — Commerce’s by‑weight allocation was unsupported by substantial evidence and must be reconsidered.
Exhaustion of administrative remedies (Bhushan production issue)	SeAH later argued Bhushan did not actually produce OCTG in meaningful quantities.	Government/CIT: SeAH failed to exhaust this argument administratively; issue was waived.	Affirmed/waived — SeAH failed to exhaust and waived the argument; Court declined to consider it.

Key Cases Cited

Downhole Pipe & Equip., L.P. v. United States, 776 F.3d 1369 (Fed. Cir. 2015) (explains surrogate‑value construction of hypothetical market value in NME cases)
Qingdao Sea–Line Trading Co. v. United States, 766 F.3d 1378 (Fed. Cir. 2014) (Commerce’s surrogate‑value selection criteria: public, product‑specific, contemporaneous)
Ad Hoc Shrimp Trade Action Comm. v. United States, 618 F.3d 1316 (Fed. Cir. 2010) (Commerce has broad discretion to choose best available information)
Dorbest Ltd. v. United States, 462 F. Supp. 2d 1262 (Ct. Int’l Trade 2006) (need to include overhead, SG&A, and profit in surrogate financial ratios)
DuPont Teijin Films China Ltd. v. United States, 7 F. Supp. 3d 1338 (Ct. Int’l Trade 2014) (criticizes by‑weight allocation for B&H absent record support)
CS Wind Vietnam Co. v. United States, 971 F. Supp. 2d 1271 (Ct. Int’l Trade 2013) (rejects weight‑based allocation where document‑preparation costs do not vary with weight)
Nan Ya Plastics Corp. v. United States, 810 F.3d 1333 (Fed. Cir. 2016) (gives weight to CIT findings and reiterates administrative‑law review standards)
QVD Food Co. v. United States, 658 F.3d 1318 (Fed. Cir. 2011) (burden on parties to create an adequate administrative record)
Universal Camera Corp. v. NLRB, 340 U.S. 474 (1951) (substantial‑evidence review requires considering evidence that detracts from agency findings)
PAM, S.p.A. v. United States, 582 F.3d 1336 (Fed. Cir. 2009) (substantial‑evidence requires at least enough support that reasonable minds could differ)