T-Mobile USA’s proposed merger with MetroPCS is unlikely to have a significant impact on U.S. tower companies if the U.S. government approves the deal as expected (CD Oct 4 p1), industry officials told us. Any carrier consolidation is likely to lead to concerns because the tower companies end up with fewer customers -- but those concerns are mitigated by the carriers’ network build-out plans, Benchmark analyst James Dobson said. “With MetroPCS forming up with T-Mobile, it gives them a stronger parent company, more of solid capital base with which to roll out their next-generation network,” he said. “Everyone’s going to these LTE networks, and if T-Mobile’s going to compete on a national scale, they're going to have to be aggressive in building out their LTE network. That’s going to ensure that the MetroPCS will also build out."
The Centers for Excellence and Expertise (CEEs) offer a significant amount of hope and concern among the trade industry, said individuals involved in several different facets during interviews. The CEEs, which offer industry-dedicated, virtual locations for entry summary review, are currently in a pilot phase but are widely expected to see an increased role, potentially meaning a major shift in the customs world. Several concerns remain, said industry and CBP officials, but there's also hope that they will provide for simpler and more uniform customs processes.
International Trade Today is providing readers with some of the top stories for Oct. 1-5 in case they were missed.
Oct. 7-10 American Trucking Associations Management Conference, Mandalay Bay Resort, Las Vegas -- http://mce.trucking.org.
As export control reform continues, freight forwarders need to be thinking about employee training, monitoring, and systems controls to ensure compliance, said Paulette Kolba, chair of the National Customs Brokers and Freight Forwarders Association of America (NCBFAA) Transportation Subcommittee on Export Compliance. Kolba spoke in a webinar Oct. 4 on export control reform along with Bureau of Industry and Security Under Secretary Eric Hirschhorn.
CBP officials addressed a number of myths surrounding the agency's rewrite of broker regulations in 19 CFR Part 111. Elena Ryan, director for trade facilitation and administration at CBP said the agency heard brokers report several pieces of misinformation regarding the regulatory update. Ryan and others spoke during an Oct. 4 Webinar that provided a rundown of the agency's outreach efforts to the broker industry. The Webinar is part of agencies outreach effort to explore the "Role of the Broker."
CBP released its Trade Newsletter for the 2012 fourth quarter. The newsletter provides an update on several of the agency's efforts, including AD/CVD enforcement, new tools for finding counterfeit merchandise and recent work with the Border Interagency Executive Council
Oct. 2-4 International Air Cargo Forum, Atlanta -- http://www.tiaca.org/tiaca/Exhibition.asp?SnID=209245202
The International Trade Administration said it intends to terminate the agreement suspending the antidumping investigation on tomatoes from Mexico, in the preliminary results of its changed circumstances review. The ITA preliminarily found that 85 percent of domestic producers support ending the suspension agreement. Termination of the agreement in the final results of the ITA’s changed circumstances review would pave the way for a new antidumping investigation on tomatoes from Mexico and the possible imposition of duties.
Search engines are being used by “unscrupulous moving companies” to mislead consumers, Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., said in letters to Google, Yahoo and Microsoft (http://xrl.us/bnrir2). In the letters, Rockefeller asked the companies to review findings of a committee staff report on “Internet moving brokers” (http://xrl.us/bnrir4) presented at a committee hearing last week. It described how moving brokers -- online companies that profit from facilitating transactions between customers and home goods carriers -- manipulate and defraud individuals, including through search engine optimization (SEO).