BlueScope Steel filed an antidumping suit against imported hot rolled steel coils from 4 countries including Japan. As a complaint is not received yet, its details are not known but hot coils to alloyed steel grade seem not to be included. The AD margin which the plaintiff is requesting is not reported at present.

The targeted countries of such suit are Japan, Korean, Taiwan and Malaysia. China, the biggest producer is not included. Export quantity of hot coils for Australia in fiscal 2011 was 25,000 tonnes by Japan, 21,000 tonnes by Korea and 55,000 tonnes by Taiwan. That from Malaysia is not known. That from China remained at 7,000 tonnes. There is a possibility that the countries exceeding 10,000 tonnes' export were targeted for the AD case.

In the Pacific Ocean area, supply of steel products is exceeding demand for them, and while prices have dropped largely, competition among the mills is becoming severe. Under the situation that prices of not only hot coils but also steel plates have still continued to drop, each mill has come into conflict in the export market. Under the circumstances, it is said that each country is facing a growing risk of the AD suit. Japan's export of hot coils for Australia is a little over 2,000 tonnes a month, and each Japanese mill is likely to export avoiding damages on the Australian industry. Even in the case, Japan is also targeted.

Meantime, there was the case that Australia filed an AD suit in 2003 against steel plates from Japan and others (Korea, China and Indonesia), and determined to be positive (such AD measures were lifted in April, 2009). It is said that the country commenced in April this year an AD investigation on electrical resistance welded pipes tubes against Thailand, China, Korea, Malaysia and Taiwan. In this case, Japan was not included.

Source - TEX Report Limited

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