We take intellectual property rights seriously. This Copyright Policy outlines the ownership of content on our website and services, how you are permitted to use that content, and how we handle copyright infringement issues. Our goal is to foster a respectful environment for content creation and sharing, in compliance with Hong Kong copyright law and applicable international standards.

Unless otherwise noted, all content on our website and provided through our services is copyrighted material owned by Al Banyan Tree or its content suppliers/licensors. This includes, but is not limited to, the text, data compilations, reports, graphs and charts, photographs, illustrations, video and audio content, design layout, look and feel of the website, source code, and software used to provide the platform. The compilation of all content is the exclusive property of Al Banyan Tree and is protected by Hong Kong’s Copyright Ordinance (Cap. 528) as well as international copyright treaties. We reserve all rights in our content. For clarity: any rights not expressly granted to you in our Terms of Use or in this policy are reserved by us 11.

You do not acquire any ownership rights by purchasing a subscription or using our site. We grant you a limited license to access and use the content for your personal or internal business purposes only, subject to the restrictions below. Any trademarks or service marks that appear in our content (such as our company name in a report or our logo on a chart) are protected as described in the Trademarks Statement, and any use of those must comply with that policy as well.

You are authorized to view, download, and print reports, data, or pages from our website for your personal use or your company’s internal use (if you are an authorized user under a company subscription). For example, if you subscribe to our commodity analytics reports, you may download a PDF report and share it internally with your colleagues for discussion. However, this permission is subject to the following conditions:

• No Redistribution or Republication: You may not copy, reproduce, distribute, or publicly display any substantial portion of our content outside your organization without our prior written consent 11. This means you cannot, for instance, post our reports on a public website, republish our research in a newsletter, or otherwise make it available to third parties. If you need to share excerpts of our analysis with a client of yours or include them in a publication, please contact us to discuss licensing options.
• No Derivative Works: You may not create derivative works based on our content without permission. This includes altering, editing, translating, or combining our materials with other data to publish your own report. (Internal use of our data to create internal presentations or insights is fine; we mainly restrict the creation of new public content that derives from ours.)
• Retaining Notices: If you download or print any content for permitted use, you must retain all copyright and proprietary notices as they appear on the original (for example, footer notices in a report, or watermarks on charts) 12. You may not remove, obscure, or modify any attribution or legal notice from copies of content.
• Non-Commercial Use Only (External): You are not allowed to exploit our content commercially outside of the licensed use. This means you cannot sell, license, or commercially benefit from our materials to third parties. Our services are subscription-based, and the subscription fee covers internal use. External commercial exploitation would require a separate agreement.
• Caching and Automated Access: You may not use bots, crawlers, or scraping technologies to systematically download our content, nor may you cache substantial portions of our site on a server, except as automatically done by your browser or ISP for transient purposes. If you are an indexing service that wishes to crawl our site for search purposes, you must obey our site’s robots.txt file and any rate limitations. Unauthorized scraping or harvesting of data is prohibited.

If we provide any content under specific license terms (for example, a blog post released under Creative Commons or an API with its own terms), those specific terms will override this general policy for that content. Always check for any license information provided alongside the content. For any use not expressly permitted by this policy or by law (such as fair use exceptions), you should obtain our written permission.

Generally, our platform does not allow public user-generated content (e.g., we don’t host public forums or user blogs). In the event you are allowed to contribute content (for example, if we open a comment section on articles, or you provide a guest analysis), you must ensure that your contributions do not violate the copyrights or rights of any third party. By submitting any content to our site, you affirm that it is your own original work or that you have obtained all necessary rights and licenses to post it. You also grant us a license to use and display that content as described in our Terms of Use (typically, a nonexclusive, worldwide, royalty-free license to host and publish your submission). We reserve the right to remove any user-contributed content that is alleged to infringe copyright.

If you believe that any content on our website or delivered through our services infringes your copyright (or that of someone you represent), please notify us so that we can investigate and address the issue. Although as a Hong Kong company we are not directly subject to the United States DMCA, we voluntarily follow a similar “notice-and-takedown” procedure as a best practice for handling copyright complaints 13. Here’s how to submit a complaint:

Notice of Infringement: Please send a written notice to our designated copyright agent at [copyright@companydomain.com] with the subject line “Copyright Infringement Notice.” Include the following information: (1) a description of the copyrighted work that you claim has been infringed; (2) a description of where the material you claim is infringing is located (a URL on our site, or reference to the report/email in question); (3) your contact information (name, affiliation, address, email, phone); (4) a statement that you have a good faith belief that the disputed use is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law; (5) a statement, under penalty of perjury, that the information you have provided is accurate and that you are the copyright owner or authorized to act on the copyright owner’s behalf; and (6) your physical or electronic signature. If you are unsure whether the material is indeed infringing, you may want to seek legal advice before submitting a notice, as false claims can have legal consequences 14.

Upon receiving a valid infringement notice, we will promptly acknowledge it and investigate. If the claim appears credible, we will remove or disable access to the allegedly infringing material while the matter is reviewed 13. We will also notify the user who posted or provided the affected content (if applicable) about the complaint, and provide them an opportunity to respond (file a counter-notice) as per a standard DMCA-like process. Our team may also reach out to you for any clarifications needed in your notice. We aim to resolve these matters expeditiously, either by removing infringing content or restoring it if a counter-notice proves the use was authorized or falls under an exception (such as fair use). Repeat infringers’ accounts or access to our services will be terminated when appropriate , in accordance with our internal policy and applicable laws.

Counter-Notice: If you are a user whose content was removed due to a copyright complaint and you believe the removal was mistaken or that you have the right to use the material, you may send us a counter-notice. Provide: (1) identification of what was removed and where it appeared; (2) a statement under penalty of perjury that you believe in good faith the material was removed by mistake or misidentification; (3) your consent to the jurisdiction of Hong Kong courts (or if you’re outside Hong Kong, consent to jurisdiction of Hong Kong and an agreement to accept service of process from the complaining party); and (4) your signature. If we receive a valid counter-notice, we will forward it to the original complainant. If the complainant does not inform us within 14 days that they have filed a court action to restrain you from using the material, we may restore the material, at our discretion 16 17. (Please note, if the original complaint was under U.S. DMCA, the legal timelines and requirements of the DMCA will be followed as applicable.)

If you wish to use our content in a manner not covered by the above (for example, as a professor you want to include our chart in a classroom presentation, or as a journalist you want to quote a paragraph from our analysis in an article), please contact us for permission. We often grant permission for such uses free of charge for non-commercial or news reporting purposes, provided proper attribution is given (e.g., citing us as the source and linking to our site). For commercial uses (such as including our data in a product you sell), a licensing fee or other arrangement may apply. We will evaluate requests on a case-by-case basis.

Respect for Our Copyright: We trust our users and subscribers to act responsibly. Unauthorized use or copying of our content not only breaches our terms but could also violate copyright laws, which provide for damages and penalties. We sincerely hope never to have to pursue legal action; however, we will protect our intellectual property when necessary. In Hong Kong, copyright infringement (especially for commercial advantage) can lead to civil liability and even criminal penalties under the Copyright Ordinance. We prefer to resolve issues amicably, so if you are ever in doubt about usage, just ask us.

By using our website and services, you agree to comply with this Copyright Policy. We thank you for respecting our intellectual property rights. Your cooperation enables us to continue creating highquality analytics and insights for your benefit. If you have any questions about this policy or any requests regarding our content, please reach out to [legal@companydomain.com].