As many of you will know the PET resin producers, DAK, Nan Ya and M&G instigated an anti-dumping case against PET resin exporters in China, India, Oman and Canada in 2015. In addition to the anti-dumping claim there was also a claim of illegal government subsidies being provided to support the exporters. The US Department of Commerce found that imports of PET resin were dumped from all four countries and that imports from China and India were also subsidized. The DoC established both anti-dumping and countervailing duty penalties, but the critical step had to be to prove that the dumping had caused injury to the US industry and this had to be determined by the International Trade Commission (ITC).

The following link advises that the ITC found unanimously in favor of the industry that there had been injury.

AKC Note: This is clearly very good news for the domestic producers and very bad news for the exporting companies in the countries listed. The penalties vary between countries and also between individual producers within a country, but it is sufficient to say that in a highly price sensitive market such as exists for PET resin there is unlikely to be any room for additional costs to be covered and to still offer a competitively priced product. From a fiber industry point of view, much of the polyester BCF is produced from PET resin rather than fiber chip and certainly some of the exporters from the listed countries were supplying to the carpet industry. A less obvious impact may be that with the success of this case behind them the polyester staple producers might be encouraged to consider a similar approach to the rapidly increasing volume of staple fiber imports into the US, particularly from China.

Alasdair Carmichael

Carmichael International

PO Box 3444

Spartanburg, SC 29304

T: 864 583 6868

C:864 542 4481

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