OCTOBER 2013 – Electrical Steel – The domestic manufacturers of Silicon Electric Steel (AK Steel and Allegheny Technologies, Inc.), have filed Antidumping Duty petitions as well as Countervailing Duty petitions with the U.S. Department of Commerce and the U.S. International Trade Commission. These actions were filed against specific countries with respect to Silicon Electric Steel sales within the United States.
The petitions covering Grain Oriented Electrical Steels (GOES) were filed jointly by AK Steel, Allegheny Technologies, Inc. and the United Steelworkers union (USW). They claim that unfairly traded imports of GOES from seven named countries are causing material injury to the domestic steel industry.
The petitions covering Non-Oriented Electrical Steel (NOES) were filed by AK Steel and also claim material injury to the domestic steel industry as a result of practices of several named countries in which producers of these steel products are located.
The Antidumping Duty petitions relate to what the claimants describe as unfairly low priced imports of these steel products.
The Countervailing Duty petitions assert that certain producers are heavily subsidized by their respective governments.
Specific to the NOES petitions, AK Steel believes that certain global NOES producers have increased capacity to produce these grades of steel and that they have dumped their surplus capacity into the US Market. They believe that this has adversely affected the US market pricing for these products.
Because these grades of steel are such an integral aspect of the products that we supply to our customers, Sko-Die believes that these actions, initiated by the domestic producers of these materials, may have an immediate impact on the market pricing for these materials. Depending on how these cases play out, the effects could have both short term and long term material cost implications. Our team is staying close to the issue and will keep our customers advised as to what, if any effect this action will have on the products that we supply.
Decisions are expected soon in these cases by the DOC and ITC as to whether these petitions have merit and what steps will be taken to investigate and act upon these claims. For additional information please contact Sko-Die so that we can address any questions that you may have and discuss with you the potential implications of these actions by the producing mills.
For additional reference, please use the following links.
http://www.aksteel.com/news/press_release.aspx?doc_id=1016&year=2013
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/ak-steel-files-trade-cases-on-non-oriented-electrical-steel-2013-09-30
At Sko-Die we remain –
