CIT Sustains Authority to Countervail Currency Devaluation, Remands Specifics of Subsidy

The Court of International Trade sustained the Commerce Department's authority to "promulgate" its regulation allowing the agency to countervail Vietnam's currency undervaluation. However, Judge Timothy Reif issued a lengthy remand to the agency regarding whether exporter Kumho Tire (Vietnam) Co. benefited from the currency undervaluation in a countervailing duty investigation.

The judge told Commerce to clearly state the authority it used to rely on the "available data regarding USD inflows to Vietnam as a proxy for USD currency conversions." Reif also told the agency to provide a "clear statement of what precisely Commerce considered to be missing from the record" due to failures by the Vietnamese government to submit certain information.

The decision also required Commerce to specify whether it assumed the currency undervaluation was evenly spread in the traded goods sector as part of its specificity determination and to explain more clearly size discrepancies in foreign exchange net purchases between two Treasury Department reports.