The Department of Justice is now investigating price-fixing in the PVC pipe market following a class action lawsuit filed in August which alleges manufacturers conspired to fix, raise, maintain and stabilize the price of PVC products used for drinking water and to house bundled wires.

Ten leading PVC pipe manufacturers, along with information exchange firm OPIS, were named as defendants, while three major PVC pipe distributors — Core & Main, Ferguson and Fortiline Waterworks (a subsidiary of Reece), were named as co-conspirators.

While the DoJ hasn’t made its investigation known publicly, Otter Tail, one of the defendant manufacturers, disclosed the probe in a SEC filing last month.

The manufacturer, which owns Northern Pipe, said it received a grand jury subpoena to provide documents regarding the manufacturing, selling and pricing of PVC pipe.

In Otter Tail’s filing, the company said an antitrust violation “could have a material impact” on its financial condition, and said “there are factual and legal [defenses] to the allegations in the complaints and intends to defend itself accordingly.

While no distributors are listed as defendants of the lawsuit, a Core & Main spokesperson told the Financial Times it was “unaware of any price fixing, that any suggestion of its involvement was baseless and that ‘honesty and integrity are part of our core principles.'” MDM is not aware of any other comment by the distributors named in the case.

For more information on the class action lawsuit, read MDM’s first report.

In November, New York’s Erie County Water Authority likewise filed a nearly identical lawsuit against OPIS and seven PVC manufacturing companies — Atkore, Diamond Plastics, JM Eagle, National Pipe and Plastics, Otter Tail, IPEX and Westlake Corporation. It named the same distribution co-conspirators as the other case but omitted Cantex, Prime Conduit and Southern Pipe from the defendant list.

Lead photo by sndrk via iStock