Antidumping and Countervailing Duties (AD/CVD)

Antidumping (AD) and countervailing (CVD) duties are trade remedies imposed under the Tariff Act of 1930. An antidumping duty applies when the Department of Commerce finds a class of merchandise is sold in the United States at less than fair value and the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC) finds a U.S. industry is materially injured or threatened by those imports; it equals the amount by which normal value exceeds the export price (19 U.S.C. 1673). A countervailing duty offsets a countervailable subsidy from a foreign government and equals the net subsidy (19 U.S.C. 1671). Both are charged on top of the regular duty.

Who does what

• Commerce (International Trade Administration) investigates, sets the rates, writes the scope and runs the reviews
• ITC decides whether the U.S. industry is injured
• CBP collects the cash deposits at entry and liquidates the entries at the final rate

Case numbers and scope

Every order has a case number such as A-533-xxx or C-570-xxx: A- is antidumping, C- countervailing, and the middle digits are Commerce's country code (533 India, 570 China, 552 Vietnam). The case number goes on the entry summary line, and an AD/CVD entry is filed as ACE entry type 03. Each order has a written scope. Order notices typically list HTS numbers for convenience and customs purposes and state that the written description is dispositive. When coverage is unclear, Commerce issues a scope ruling, and a ruling that a product is covered means it has always been covered (19 CFR 351.225).

Cash deposits and final duty

At entry the importer deposits the estimated duty at the rate assigned to its exporter or producer, or the all-others or country-wide rate. The United States uses a retrospective system: each year in the anniversary month of the order, interested parties, including the importer, can request an administrative review that sets the final duty for that period (19 CFR 351.213). Liquidation is suspended until the review ends, then CBP bills or refunds the difference, so these entries often stay open for years. The bond cannot be waived on an AD/CVD entry, and CBP may require a single-transaction bond in some cases. Orders are reviewed every five years in a sunset review.

Mistakes that are expensive

• Checking only the HTS code: the scope wording, not the tariff number, decides coverage
• Relying on the rate in the original order: the deposit rate changes with each review
• Budgeting only the deposit: a higher final rate is billed at liquidation, years later
• Transshipping or misdeclaring origin to avoid an order: CBP investigates evasion under the Enforce and Protect Act

Look up any order in place by product, country or case number with the AD/CVD order lookup, and check the rest of the duty with the tariff simulator.