The U.S. this week charged FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried with violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act's anti-bribery provisions. Filing a superseding indictment at the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York March 27, the U.S. Attorney's Office said Bankman-Fried and others paid around $40 million in cryptocurrency to one or more Chinese government officials to "induce them" to unfreeze certain cryptocurrency trading accounts held by one of Bankman-Fried's companies, Alameda Research (U.S. v. Samuel Bankman-Fried, S.D.N.Y. # 22-00673).
Trade Law Daily is providing readers with the top stories from last week in case you missed them. All articles can be found by searching on the title or by clicking on the hyperlinked reference number.
The Court of International Trade on March 29 dismissed a lawsuit from cell phone case maker Otter Products seeking interest on customs duty overpayments, finding it lacked jurisdiction to hear the case. Judge Claire Kelly held that the Administrative Procedure Act waiver of sovereign immunity only applies to interest on deposits linked with liquidated entries. As a result, there is no specific waiver of immunity related to Otter's claim for interest for its overpayments on tendered prior disclosures "under the no-interest rule," Kelly said.
Congress intended for subsidies given to "disparate processed agricultural products" to be countervailable under countervailing duty laws, the Coalition for Fair Trade in Ripe Olives argued in a reply brief at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. Responding to arguments from three Spanish olive exporters against the Commerce Department's "substantially dependent finding" in the Spanish olives CVD investigation, the coalition said that Commerce "responsibly interpreted the statutory language broadly" and in line with statutory intent (Asociacion de Exportadores e Industriales de Aceitunas de Mesa v. U.S., Fed. Cir. # 23-1162).
No lawsuits were recently filed at the Court of International Trade.
Commerce made errors in its calculations, choice of data, and use of adverse facts available during the eighth administrative review of the antidumping duty order on crystalline silicon photovoltaic cells from China, according to four separate motions for judgment filed at the Court of International Trade. The case combined several complaints all challenging aspects of Commerce’s final determination (see 2208300012) (Jinko Solar Import and Export Co. v. U.S., CIT # 22-00219).
No lawsuits were recently filed at the Court of International Trade.
Missouri-based steel distributor Mid Continent Steel & Wire will appeal a Feb. 15 opinion by Court of International Trade Judge M. Miller Baker that nullified a "draconian" antidumping duty rate imposed on Oman Fasteners, according to a March 23 notice of appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. In the CIT case, Baker found that Commerce abused its discretion by using adverse facts available to calculate a dumping rate of 154.33% for Oman Fasteners based on a single filing submitted 16 minutes late (see 2302280040). The case at CIT is still ongoing (Oman Fasteners v, United States, CIT # 22-0348).
The Court of International Trade stayed proceedings in a customs penalty case for another three months to allow the U.S. and defendants, led by Chu-Chiang "Kevin" Ho, to "finalize resolution of the matters." Judge Timothy Reif gave the parties until June 22 to either settle the case or file a joint status report. The U.S. seeks penalties due to fraud totalling over $2.9 million from Ho, Wintis Corp., Ship Communications, Aelis Nova and Maderdove. The government said Ho knowingly misclassified headlight conversion kits resulting in a duty underpayment (U.S. v. Chu-Chiang "Kevin" Ho, CIT # 19-00102).
The following lawsuit was recently filed at the Court of International Trade: