Matthew Axelrod, the Bureau of Industry and Security's former export enforcement chief, has joined Gibson Dunn to help lead the firm's new sanctions and export enforcement practice group. Axelrod and former Treasury Department senior adviser Adam Smith will co-chair the new group, which they said will aim to help clients navigate rising export control and sanctions risks.
A Federal Maritime Commission administrative law judge ordered Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC) Feb. 25 to pay about $16 million in civil penalties for violating U.S. shipping laws.
The Alliance for Chemical Distribution asked the Trump administration to support a renewal of the Generalized System of Preferences benefits program in Congress. The GSP program has been expired for more than four years.
The EU chairman of the Committee for International Trade and a former U.S. trade representative predicted that the trade dispute between the U.S. and the EU is unlikely to subside soon due to "fundamental disagreements" over economic policy.
Double Ace Cargo, a Florida-based non-vessel-operating common carrier (NVOCC), has paid $165,000 in civil penalties and is paying for an independent monitoring of its business practices under two compromise agreements it reached with the Federal Maritime Commission over the past nearly two years, the FMC announced Feb. 7.
A new vessel sharing agreement between Japanese carrier Ocean Network Express, South Korea-based Hyundai Merchant Marine and Taiwan-based Yang Ming Marine Transportation (see 2411070005) will take effect Feb. 9, the Federal Maritime Commission said Feb. 6 after completing its review. The commission said it carried out an “economic analysis of the competitive effects of the” arrangement, called the Premier Alliance Agreement, adding that all agreements “are subject to the strictest standards for ongoing monitoring by the Commission.”
Commerce secretary nominee Howard Lutnick vigorously defended the prospect of imposing tariffs on all goods from places like the EU, Japan or South Korea during his confirmation hearing Jan. 29, saying those countries deserve it, as they either use food safety rules to protect their farmers, put up barriers to American car imports, or undercut American manufacturing with their exports of manufactured goods.
The creation of an External Revenue Service (ERS) to collect tariffs, duties and other foreign trade-related revenues could result in realigning CBP so that the agency would fall under the Department of the Treasury instead of DHS, according to two ArentFox Schiff attorneys.
President Donald Trump posted that if Russian President Vladimir Putin doesn't "make a 'deal,' and soon, I have no other choice but to put high levels of Taxes, Tariffs, and Sanctions on anything being sold by Russia to the United States, and various other participating countries."
The Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau is again proposing to require an “Alcohol Facts” label and require food allergen disclosures on all alcoholic beverage labels subject to TTB regulation, it said in a pair of final rules released Jan. 16.