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Investing.com - Shares in First Solar Inc (NASDAQ:FSLR) rose in premarket trading on Wall Street on Tuesday, after U.S. trade officials slapped steep new tariffs on most solar cells delivered from Southeast Asia.
The move to finalize the duties concludes a year-old trade case brought by Arizona-based First Solar, Korea's Hanwha Qcells (KS:000880), and several other smaller producers which accused Chinese firms of dumping unfairly cheap items in the U.S.
Chinese solar panel manufacturers with factories in Cambodia, Thailand, Vietnam and Malaysia were allegedly selling their products in the U.S. at artificially low prices and receiving subsidies, the American Alliance for Solar Manufacturing Trade Committee -- the petitioner group -- said.
Solar cells imported from those countries could now face higher duties than preliminary tariffs announced last year, effectively making the goods unsellable in the U.S.
Products from Cambodia, in particular, would now incur levies of more than 3,500% because its manufacturers chose not to collaborate with an investigation by the U.S. Department of Commerce.
Other items from Malaysia made by Jinko Solar have combined dumping and countervailing tariffs of 41.56%, among the lowest announced, while those on rival Trina Solar's operations in Thailand amount to 375.19%.
The International Trade Commission is due to vote in June on whether the industry has been materially harmed by the dumping and subsidizing of these products.
The four countries accounted for more than $10 billion in solar supplies to the U.S. last year, amounting to a majority of the domestic supply. But, with the threat of tariffs looming, imports from these nations has fallen sharply, and shipments from countries like Laos and Indonesia are growing.
Critics, including the Solar Energy Industries Association, have argued that the tariffs will ultimately harm U.S. producers by raising prices on the solar cells which are then assembled into panels at American factories.
(Reuters contributed reporting.)
