Timken Co. v. United States

59 F. Supp. 2d 1371, 23 Ct. Int'l Trade 509, 23 C.I.T. 509, 21 I.T.R.D. (BNA) 1652, 1999 Ct. Intl. Trade LEXIS 65
United States Court of International Trade·Decided July 30, 1999·No. Slip Op. 99-73; Court 97-03-00394·Published·Cited by 15 cases

Opinion

OPINION

TSOUCALAS, Senior Judge.

Plaintiff, The Timken Company (“Timken”), moves pursuant to Rule 56.2 of the Rules of this Court for judgment on the agency record challenging the Department of Commerce, International Trade Administration’s (“Commerce”) final determination, entitled Tapered Roller Bearings and Parts Thereof, Finished and Unfinished, From the People’s Republic of China; Final Results and Partial Termination of Antidumping Duty Administrative Review, 62 Fed.Reg. 6,173 (Feb. 11, 1997).

Background

The administrative review at issue concerns tapered roller bearings (“TRBs”) and parts thereof, finished and unfinished, imported from the People’s Republic of *1373 China (“PRC”) during the eighth period of review covering June 1, 1994 through May 31, 1995. 1 Commerce published the preliminary results of the subject review on August 5, 1996. See Tapered Roller Bearings and Parts Thereof, Finished and Unfinished, From the People’s Republic of China; Preliminary Results of Antidump-ing Administrative Review and Intent to Revoke Antidumping Duty Order in Part (“Preliminary Results”), 61 Fed.Reg. 40,-610. On February 11, 1997, Commerce published the Final Results at issue. See 62 Fed.Reg. 6,173. The Court granted L & S Bearing Company’s Motion to Intervene on May 20, 1997, after which the company did not file any additional papers.

Discussion

The Court has jurisdiction in this case pursuant to 19 U.S.C. § 1516a(a)(2) (1994) and 28 U.S.C. § 1581(c) (1994).

The Court must uphold Commerce’s final antidumping determination unless it is “unsupported by substantial evidence on the record, or otherwise not in accordance with law.” 19 U.S.C. § 1516a(b)(l)(B). Substantial evidence is “more than a mere scintilla. It means such relevant evidence as a reasonable mind might accept as adequate to support a conclusion.” Universal Camera Corp. v. NLRB, 340 U.S. 474, 477, 71 S.Ct. 456, 95 L.Ed. 456 (1951) (quoting Consolidated Edison Co. v. NLRB, 305 U.S. 197, 229, 59 S.Ct. 206, 83 L.Ed. 126 (1938)). “It is not within the Court’s domain either to weigh the adequate quality or quantity of the evidence for sufficiency or to reject a finding on grounds of a differing interpretation of the record.” Timken Co. v. United States, 12 CIT 955, 962, 699 F.Supp. 300, 306 (1988), aff'd, 894 F.2d 385 (Fed.Cir.1990).

A. Commerce’s Selection of Indonesian Import Statistics as a Surrogate Value for Raw-Material Costs of Steel Used by Chinese Producers to Manufacture TRB Cups and Cones

In this case, Commerce determined that the TRBs from the PRC were being sold in the United States at a price less than what the foreign merchandise sells for in the home market, that is, being sold at less than its fair value (“LTFV”). Further, the International Trade Commission determined that these LFTV sales threatened the United States domestic industry producing the same merchandise with material injury. Because Commerce determined that the PRC is a non-market economy (“NME”) country, Commerce calculated the foreign market value (“FMV”) of the TRBs using the factors of production (“FOPs”) based on values from surrogate countries pursuant to 19 U.S.C. § 1677b(e) (1988).

In the Preliminary Results, Commerce used data from a 1994-95 annual report (“Report”) of SKF Bearings India, Ltd. (“SKF India”), a producer of similar merchandise in India, to determine the values of the following FOPs for calculating FMV: (1) overhead; (2) selling, general and administrative expenses (“SG & A”); and (3) profit. See 61 Fed.Reg. at 40,613. For the direct-labor factor, Commerce used surrogate values derived, with adjustments, from Indian public labor data, Investing, Licensing & Trading Conditions Abroad, India (“IL & T”), published in November 1994 by the Economist Intelligence Unit. See id. For the raw-materials factor, Commerce used, with adjustments, Indian import statistics as the best information available (“BIA”) for valuing the steel used by Chinese producers to manufacture the TRBs. 2 See id. (citing Monthly

*1374 Statistics of the Foreign Trade of India, Volume II — Imports).

In the Final Results, Commerce determined that, contrary to its preliminary determination, the Indian import statistics were not reliable for valuing bearing-quality steel used to produce TRB cups and cones because (1) Commerce was unable to isolate an Indian import value for bearing-quality steel, and (2) Commerce found that the value of the Indian import data was significantly higher than (a) bearing-quality steel imported into the United States, and (b) similar European Union steel-import data. 3 See 62 Fed.Reg. at 6,179-80. Commerce, therefore, selected India as a primary surrogate country for valuing steel used to produce TRB rollers and cages and Indonesia as a secondary surrogate country for valuing steel used to produce TRB cups and cones. See id. at 6,177, 6,180. Commerce further determined that these surrogates comprised the BIA for valuing raw-material costs in its FOPs calculations. See id. at 6,177.

In addition, in calculating the overhead, SG & A and profitratios, Commerce used data from SKF India’s Report in both the numerators (SKF India’s overhead, SG & A, and profit, respectively) and the denominator (the sum of SKF India’s material and labor costs, that is, the total cost of manufacturing (“COM”)). See id. at 6,178. Commerce noted that this methodology allowed it to derive internally consistent ratios of SKF India’s overhead and SG & A expenses. See id. Commerce concluded that these ratios, when multiplied by the Indonesian and Indian raw-material costs and the IL & T labor data, constituted the BIA concerning overhead and SG & A expenses that would be incurred by a Chinese TRB producer given such FOPs. See id.

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Timken Co. v. United States, 59 F. Supp. 2d 1371, 23 Ct. Int'l Trade 509, 23 C.I.T. 509, 21 I.T.R.D. (BNA) 1652, 1999 Ct. Intl. Trade LEXIS 65 (cit 1999).

59 F. Supp. 2d 1371 (Timken Co. v. United States) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.

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