The United States imposes 721% tariffs on products like China

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On May 20, 2025, the U.S. Department of Commerce announced a preliminary affirmative ruling on the Counter Subsidy Tax (CVD) investigation of China's active anode materials, determining that there are unfair subsidies for active anode materials imported from China, and decided to impose a counter-subsidy tax of up to 721.03% on related products.

Active anode materials are a key component of lithium-ion batteries in electric vehicles, covering natural and artificial graphite and silicon. The tariffs imposed this time mainly involve products under the US Customs Code 2504.10.5000 and 3801.10.5000. According to the U.S. Department of Commerce, the United States imported about 0 million in active anode materials from China in 2023.

While making a preliminary ruling on anti-subsidy tax, the U.S. Department of Commerce also conducted an anti-dumping duty (AD) investigation on active anode materials from China, and is expected to make a preliminary ruling on May 27, 2025. Afterwards, the U.S. Department of Commerce will make a final ruling on September 19, 2025, but this ruling requires approval from the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC), and the ITC will make a final ruling on November 13, 2025, and the final order will be issued on November 20, 2025.

China is the world's largest graphite producer and dominates the graphite industry. According to Capstone LLC data, the United States is extremely dependent on China on graphite, with 59% of natural graphite and 68% of artificial graphite imported from China. American graphite producers are one of the important petitioners to promote the authorities to launch an investigation. They believe that Chinese manufacturers have received high subsidies, which artificially lowered prices, has made local American manufacturers extremely unfavorable in market competition and difficult to compete with.

This time, the US Department of Commerce has preliminarily ruled that it imposes high anti-subsidy taxes on China's active anode materials. The so-called purpose is to crack down on China's subsidy behavior for battery materials. At the same time, separate investigations on suspected unfair pricing are also underway.

It is worth mentioning that Tesla clearly opposed the imposition of tariffs earlier this year on the grounds of lack of qualified domestic supply. However, judging from the ruling of the US Department of Commerce, the US government seems to value the so-called long-term industrial resilience rather than the market chaos that may be triggered in the short term.

In addition, the Republican- recently promoted tax reform plan is expected to cancel consumer credits for electric vehicles, and a significant increase in tariffs will further increase the cost of electric vehicles for U.S. manufacturers. However, these trade cases against China's active anode materials are expected to be finalized later this year and have nothing to do with the broad tariffs imposed by the U.S. president on all trading partners and the planned tariffs on semiconductors, medicines and other areas.

This series of measures will undoubtedly intensify trade frictions between China and the United States in the field of battery materials and have a profound impact on the global electric vehicle industry chain.