Opinion ID: 3066250
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Aberrational Nature of Philippine Import Data

Text: Cherishmet also faults the Philippine import data as aberrational compared to the surrogate values for carbonized material in prior reviews of the subject merchandise. During this period of review, Commerce calculated a price of $1,203.90 per metric ton of carbonized material based on the Philippine import data. Cherishmet asserts that Commerce priced the surrogate value of carbonized material much lower in prior reviews: Period of Surrogate Value Review 1st $32.99/MT $66.256/MT (coconut shell charcoal); 2nd $435.62/MT (coal-based carbonized mate- rial) 3rd $83.45/MT Cherishmet’s Br. 32–33 (citations omitted). It argues that the Cocommunity data, with a price of $255 per metric ton, maps more closely to Commerce’s prior valuations of carbonized material than the Philippine import data, with a price almost five times as high. 14 JACOBI CARBONS AB v. US The surrogate values presented by Cherishmet suggest that the Philippine import data is aberrational. And Commerce may opt to disregard data where there is record evidence that it is aberrational. Here, however, we cannot conclude that Commerce should have disregarded the Philippine import data as aberrational. The government argues that there is an explanation for the apparently aberrational nature of the Philippine import data. Commerce selected India as the surrogate country in the first three periods of review. See J.A. 733– 35. In the fourth period of review, Commerce found that India was not at a comparable level of economic development to the PRC, and therefore selected a different surrogate country. See id.; see also J.A. 94–96. Thus, the first three surrogate values were calculated with reference to a different level of economic development than the current surrogate value. Looking at the table above, it is not entirely clear which measure is appropriate for comparison to determine whether the Philippine import data is aberrationally high. Commerce’s price of $1203.90 is more than thirty times more than the surrogate value calculated for the first period of review ($32.99/MT) and nearly fifteen times higher than the surrogate value calculated for the third period of review ($83.45/MT). Both of these comparisons lead toward a conclusion that the Philippine import data is aberrational, and it seems unlikely that the switch from India to the Philippines could account for this dramatic change in pricing. However, in the second period of review, Commerce separated the pricing for coconut shell charcoal ($66.256/MT) and coal-based carbonized material ($435.62/MT). The price for coal-based carbonized material is an order of magnitude higher than the price for coconut shell charcoal. Given that the bulk of the imports in question are produced using coal-based carbonized material, the price from this review is only 2.8 times higher than the surrogate value for coal-based carbonized JACOBI CARBONS AB v. US 15 material from the second period of review. Perhaps this disparity would have been enough to cause Commerce to reach a different conclusion regarding the best available information. Or perhaps Commerce would have concluded that the Cocommunity data for coconut shell charcoal, which was priced at $255/MT, was too low. Its prior determination during the second period of review that coal-based carbonized material was much more expensive than coconut shell charcoal may have only reinforced its conclusion here that the Philippine data was the best available information. We do not know how Commerce would have evaluated this complicated issue because it was not raised below. Neither Jacobi nor Cherishmet presented any evi- dence or made any arguments that the Philippine import data was aberrational during the administrative review. This is another new argument made for the first time at the CIT on judicial review of Commerce’s decision, not to Commerce itself. If all of the arguments made on appeal had been made to Commerce and the record made to support them, Commerce may well have reached a different conclusion regarding the best available information. We will not create a new record, entertain new arguments, and reverse Commerce on the basis of them.