US Takes Aim at Chinese TVs in Trade Row

US Takes Aim at Chinese TVs in Trade Row Tue Nov 25, 1:48 AM ET Add Business - Reuters to My Yahoo!

WASHINGTON/HONG KONG (Reuters) - The United States accused Chinese companies of dumping televisions on the U.S. market and slapped stiff duties on the products, in the latest flare-up in trade tension between the two economic giants.

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The U.S. Commerce Department (news - web sites) ruled on Monday that televisions from four Chinese firms were being sold in the United States at less than fair value and announced provisional anti-dumping duties of 28 to 46 percent on the sets.

The ruling follows a U.S. decision last week to limit imports of some Chinese textiles and added to tension between the world's biggest and fifth biggest trading nations, fanning fears in Asia that the United States was growing more protectionist.

U.S. television makers and unions complained that imports from China and Malaysia had mushroomed to 2.65 million sets a year in 2002 from 210,000 two years earlier. No ruling was made on Malaysian televisions.

"Dumping can seriously injure or destroy an entire industry," Tom Hopson, the president of Tennessee television maker Five Rivers Electronic Innovations LLC said in a statement.

"U.S. workers lose jobs when employers are forced to compete with unfair imports, which pressure U.S. manufacturers to lower prices in what is typically a futile attempt to maintain market share."

Booming Chinese factories have become important suppliers to major U.S. retailers such as Wal-Mart, boosting the U.S. trade deficit with China to a record $103 billion last year.

U.S. officials have pushed China to increase the value of its yuan, to take pressure off U.S. manufacturers who blame Chinese competition for the loss of millions of jobs.

Some analysts say they expect a series of trade skirmishes with China ahead of U.S. elections late next year. President Bush (news - web sites)'s re-election bid could be determined by a clutch of manufacturing states.

Other U.S. industries -- including iron pipe and bedroom furniture makers -- have also sought protection under anti-dumping laws.

Shares in TCL International Holdings, one of the firms affected by the ruling, slipped around two percent on Tuesday, defying a Hong Kong market rally.

But TCL, which formed a joint venture this month with French electronics maker Thomson SA to form the world's biggest TV maker, downplayed the impact of the U.S. ruling.

"The impact is small. We are not too surprised about the ruling. The European countries have been imposing a 40-50 percent (tariff)," Shirley Yau, investors relations manager at TCL International told Reuters.

The U.S. dumping finding was also made against Sichuan Changhong Electronic Co, Shenzhen Konka Group Co Ltd and Xiamen Overseas Chinese Electronic Co Ltd.

With excess capacity creating margin-crushing competition at home, Chinese television makers have used their low production costs to sell more TVs abroad.

Importers bringing televisions from China would be required to post cash deposits or bonds pending announcement of final anti-dumping duties in April, the Commerce Department said in a statement. It is unusual for duties not to be imposed once a preliminary decision has been announced.

Number-four Chinese TV maker Skyworth Digital Holdings was named in the trade complaint but escaped reprimand.

It said it might produce more high-end televisions and increase production in Mexico to gain access to the U.S. market.

"We hope the relevant Chinese authorities discuss this unfair ruling with the U.S.," Sun Weizhong, a branding executive at Skyworth, told Reuters in Beijing.

To skirt anti-dumping worries in the United States and Europe, Chinese appliance makers have been investing in overseas plants. Besides its Thomson tie-up, TCL last year acquired an insolvent German TV maker.

Chinese soybean, cotton and wheat-buying teams canceled visits to the United States after the U.S. decision on textiles, and Beijing said then it would retaliate against some U.S.> products. It gave no details.

Last week, the U.S. International Trade Commission made a final determination that two small firms had been harmed by low-priced imports of iron pipe fittings from China, paving the way for anti-dumping duties of about 11 percent.

Both the commission and the Commerce Department are expected to issue preliminary rulings next month in a dumping case brought by manufacturers of bedroom furniture against Chinese rivals. (Additional reporting by Wendy Lim in Hong Kong and Juliana Liu in Beijing)

I'm a big believer in free trade but in China's case I'll make an exception. Until they start floating their currency and/or buy a lot more American goods, we should put on some heavy tariffs on many of their exports. They buy so little from us that any retaliation would be hardly affective.

China, provider of slave labor to the world, should never have received MFN (most favored nation) status. The Bush admin realizes this and is doing in piecemeal fashion what the corrupt, criminal Clinton admin should have.

They buy so little from us that any retaliation would be hardly [e]ffective.

Oh, really?

Booming Chinese factories have become important suppliers to major U.S. retailers such as Wal-Mart, boosting the U.S. trade deficit with China to a record $103 billion last year.

Didn't take long to find Wal-Mart in that article...

I'll also note that it was the republican controlled congress which passed MFN for china, all the while complaining about the poor human rights records and their lack of religous & political freedoms.

But that's why we elect conservatives rather than moralists. Conservatives have values.

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