In December, CBP announced a four-phase transition to a Modernized ACE Portal and decommissioning the legacy ACE Portal. We are currently in Phase I and already seeing client impacts.
The House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology recently voted to advance the America Competes Act of 2022 “the Act.” This comes after the Senate passed its version of the bill, the U.S. Innovation and Competition Act, in June of 2021. The focus of the Act is to strengthen America’s scientific and technological activities in the 21st Century, in order to be able to compete with China in these critical fields in the future.
Currently there are close to 400 active antidumping cases involving nearly 40 countries. The cases cover a wide range of products including steel commodity products and steel articles (number one category), chemical products, other metal commodities and articles, plastics and rubber products, food products, paperboard and manufactured articles. Key countries subject to ADD are China (number one country by far), Korea, Indonesia, Taiwan, Thailand, Turkey, and Vietnam.
The year is 2022, and companies are turning over a new leaf, making a concerted effort to become compliant with U.S. Customs laws and practices. Seemingly, there are no downsides to conducting a comprehensive Customs compliance review and submitting a Prior Disclosure under 19 U.S.C. § 1592(c)(4) and 19 C.F.R. § 162.74.
There are new tariff classifications for machinery under Chapter 84 of the Harmonized Tariff Schedule of the United States (“HTSUS”). The changes to Chapter 84, as well as many other areas of the HTSUS, took effect on January 27, 2022, pursuant to Presidential Proclamation 10326 (December 23, 2021). Many of the changes to Chapter 84 were made to keep up with technological innovations and commercial use.
Many factors have contributed to reshaping and redefining Vietnam’s growing dynamic economy, which had once been coined by the United States as an underdeveloped country but is aggressively emerging to a developing country status.
Imagine your company imports from a vendor in Vietnam and sells them at a competitive margin in the U.S. Business is so-so until the Department of Commerce conducts an Antidumping or Countervailing Duty (“AD/CVD”) review that encompasses your company or its foreign vendor and determines the origin of your goods to be China, which causes you to owe backlogged AD/CVD at rates over 100% ad valorem for the past year.
The costly Trump-Era tariffs and trade policies have largely remained in effect nearly a year into the Biden Administration. Now more than ever, importers are looking for ways to avoid or mitigate duty exposure. Below is the lowdown of present relief from the Trump tariffs and a forecast of further relief to come.
It’s a well-known fact in the often-tumultuous world of international trade that what happens between the two largest economies, the U.S. and China, has a ripple affect around the globe.
Two bodies of export regulations typically come to mind when we think of export controls: the Export Administration Regulations (EAR) of the Commerce Department’s Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS), and the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) of the State Department’s Directorate of Defense Trade Controls (DDTC).
Trade-based money laundering (TBML) is quickly developing into a global tsunami. U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) is looking to Importers for help in identifying risk in this critical area, and for CTPAT participants, it is the newest dimension of the Minimum-Security Criteria (MSC) rolled out in 2020.
Generally, Mexican taxpayers are required to issue a CFDI for their acts, duties, income, or tax retentions. The so called CFDI is an acronym for Comprobante Fiscal Digital por Internet , and some refer to it as the electronic invoice.
In a Federal Register Notice on Oct. 6, 2021, U.S. Customs and Border Protection published a 60-Day Notice and request for comments for a Global Business Identifier (GBI) Evaluative Proof of Concept (EPoC).
The U.S Federal Trade Commission (FTC) recently codified product labelling rules related to unqualified “Made in USA” (MUSA) claims under 16 CFR Part 323
“A decentralized autonomous organization (DAO), is an organization represented by rules encoded as a computer program that is transparent, controlled by the organization members and not influenced by a central government.”
The United States Trade Representative (USTR) recently released a notice and comment period for the possible reinstatement of certain Section 301 exclusions. The majority of all Section 301 exclusions expired on December 31, 2020.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection (“CBP”) enforcement into forced labor practices continues into 2021, as CBP has detained 1,213 shipments that contained approximately $ 414 million of goods suspected to be made by forced labor this year.
Almost two years now into the global pandemic and the world’s two most powerful economies are having to take a hard long look at their supply chain shortcomings, as well as becoming economically self-sufficient to a great extent. During the pandemic it became painfully obvious that the U.S. has become far too dependent on China for imports of many essential needs.
In September 2019, the International Chamber of Commerce released Incoterms 2020, heralded as a groundbreaking version of Incoterms that would bring great change to the supply chain community. Two years later, we look back on the changes that occurred and how they have affected us.
Tariffs are inherently controversial because of their financial consequences. An importer wants to pay as little duty as possible while Customs (CBP) wants to collect as much tariff revenue as possible.
It’s goes without saying, but I will say it anyway, the recent visit to Taiwan by U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi certainly didn’t help the already strained relations much, but within her reasoning for defiance of Beijing, the democracies of the world must stand together. The Chinese Embassy has now threatened to go to war with the U.S. over Taiwan.
Most companies that employ non-U.S. persons in the United States are familiar with visa requirements, including completing U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Form I-129 – Petition for a Nonimmigrant Worker. However, many are less familiar with the affirmative due diligence and certification requirements contained in Part 6 of the I-129.
Some may be familiar with Open General Licenses (OGLs) used in the United Kingdom and some other countries. They allow export of dual-use, strategic and other controlled articles to specific destinations under certain conditions.
Since the Kremlin’s February 24th invasion of Ukraine, western countries have put in place extensive global financial ramifications. To gauge the extent of effectiveness, one must decipher the numbers behind Russia’s deceiving published economic statistics. One staggering implication of the trade war with the west lies within the entire collapse of the GDP growth acquired in the post-Soviet era.
As Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (DAOs) have exploded into public consciousness, new types of DAOs are proliferating. A novel use case for DAOs, termed “ImpactDAOs”, are defined as “any DAO that creates net positive externalities to the ecosystem around it.” An ImpactDAO seeks to use web3 and crypto-economic principles to regenerate a system, increasing resources and sustainability over time.
If you haven’t heard the words Ukraine or Russia within the last 5 months, one would assume that you must live under a rock, or that you’ve just decided to tune them out. Just as it seemed that we were on our way to being in the clear from the COVID pandemic and getting back to a little bit of normalcy within the global supply chain, the ever-so-sweet Putin decided to invade the Ukraine.
On May 23 in Tokyo, Japan, the U.S., and other countries in the Pacific region launched the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework for Prosperity (“IPEF”). The countries included are Australia, Brunei, India, Indonesia, Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, New Zealand, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection (“CBP”) released its first set of guidance relating to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (“UFLPA”), which is set to take effect on June 21, 2022. CBP’s guidance takes the form of a website that is a homepage for UFLPA-related guidance, FAQs, webinars, graphics, and CBP contact information. This essential UFLPA homepage can be accessed at: www.cbp.gov/trade/forced-labor/UFLPA.
Here we are, at the time of this writing over four months into the Russian invasion of Ukraine, with no end in sight. I will personally submit that I am, appalled that this, the murder of innocent civilians and devastation of another country’s infrastructure, can be permitted to continue, as we watch from the sidelines as if it was just another simple documentary on another war.
Many importers are eagerly awaiting the United States Trade Representative’s (“USTR”) required four-year review of the Section 301 Chinese tariffs. Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974 grants the Office of the USTR a range of responsibilities and authorities to investigate and take action to enforce U.S. rights under trade agreements and respond to certain foreign trade practices.
