AK Steel also filed countervailing duty petitions alleging that NOES producers in China, Korea and Taiwan have been heavily subsidized by their respective governments.  The petitions were filed with the U. S. Department of Commerce and the U. S. International Trade Commission.  The dumping margins alleged against the six countries are as follows:
 

Country	Dumping Margins Alleged
China	238 to 397%
Germany	70 to 87%
Japan	88 to 221%
Korea	6 to 71%
Sweden	62 to 125%
Taiwan	51 to 106%

Imports from the six targeted countries accounted for 92% of U.S. imports of NOES from all countries in 2012.  The petitions allege that these imports have had an adverse impact on AK Steel's NOES operations and on AK Steel's workforce.  Foreign producers in the targeted countries have massive and growing capacity to produce NOES, and they have been dumping their excess capacity into a grossly oversupplied U.S. market.  This has adversely affected U.S. market prices for NOES and has resulted in lower production and profits.
 
"At AK Steel, we can compete with any steelmaker, anywhere, anytime; however, we cannot, and should not, have to compete with unfairly low-priced imports and foreign governments, which is what we are doing today," said James L. Wainscott, chairman, president and CEO of AK Steel.  "We will continue to use every tool at our disposal to help remedy the situation in order to maintain our competitiveness." 
 
Antidumping duties are intended to offset the amount by which a product is sold at less than fair value, or "dumped," in the United States.  The margin of dumping is calculated by the Commerce Department.  Estimated duties in the amount of the dumping are collected from importers at the time of importation. Countervailing duties offset unfair subsidies that are provided by foreign governments. 
 
The ITC, an independent agency, will determine whether the U.S. industry producing NOES is materially injured, or threatened with material injury, by reason of the dumped and subsidized imports.
 
The Commerce Department will determine whether to initiate the antidumping and countervailing duty investigations within 20 days, and the ITC will reach a preliminary determination of material injury or threat of material injury within 45 days.  The entire investigation will take approximately one year, with final determinations of dumping, subsidization and injury to be made in the fall of 2014.  Preliminary duties, however, may be imposed during the first quarter of 2014 and remain in effect until final determinations are issued.
 
NOES is an alloy steel that contains by weight at least 1.25% but less than 3.5% of silicon and not more than 0.08% of carbon or 1.5% of aluminum.  The petitions cover NOES whether or not in coils, regardless of width, and having a thickness of 0.20 mm or more.  NOES is manufactured using a specialized rolling and annealing process.  It has a core loss that is substantially equal in any direction of magnetization in the plane of the material.  Based on these unique product characteristics, NOES is used primarily in the production of motors and generators. 
 
AK Steel is represented in these actions by Joe Dorn and Steve Jones of the law firm King & Spalding LLP.