American Airlines’ New Card is a Dud

Plus: Bilt changes milestone rewards

October 26, 2025

Citi and American Airlines launched a mid-tier card this week, the $350-fee Globe card (named after their competitor’s logo, apparently?). Its standout feature is the ability to earn 15,000 Loyalty Points after flying 12 paid segments on AA. If you don’t understand what that means and immediately want the card, it probably isn’t for you.

Here’s why: 

For that $350 fee, you’ll get 4 Admiral’s Club passes each year, a $100 credit most easily redeemed for a hotel stay or sports or concert ticket, plus refunds on in-flight purchases and small discounts on Turo bookings. The card earns 6 AAdvantage miles per dollar when booking hotels through AA, double miles on dining and transit, and only one mile on non-bonus purchases. 

The main reason to get the card is because as a cardholder, you will earn 5,000 Loyalty Points for every four paid segments on AA, up to 15,000, although it takes 40,000 to unlock AA’s lowest status tier. Even though there are a lot of ways to earn Loyalty Points, this is more of an accelerator for AA loyalists—and an expensive one—than an easy path to AA status for the rest of us.

The sign-up bonus is 90,000 AA miles, an incredibly lucrative offer that should easily equal a round-trip to Japan (other destinations exist, I know). If you value them around 1.3¢ each, as I do, that bonus is worth nearly $1,200 in travel value. But you could get fancier.

That sounds appealing, but you can currently earn 100,000 Citi points, transferable to AA, on the Citi Strata Elite (which will also get you four AA lounge passes), while the $95-fee Citi AA Executive and Citi Strata Premier often offer 75k miles or more. So while this offer is undoubtedly excellent, this amount of AA miles is not difficult to come by, and on more affordable cards. 

As for the card itself, only receiving $100 or so in non-AA benefits on a $350-fee card is way off the industry standard, where the Atmos Summit, Delta Amex Platinum, and United Quest all offer $300+ in relatively easy to redeem benefits. The Summit and Platinum even offer bigger head starts toward status. 

Lazy take 🦥

Skip this one unless you’re actively chasing AA status and willing to pay a significant annual fee for extra Loyalty Points. (For a slightly more detailed review, check out the blog.)

This week on the blog 📝

Is it time to collect points on rent with the Bilt Mastercard, or wait to see what Bilt Cards will look like when the lineup changes in 2026? We weighed the pros and cons. 

Quick Points of the Week ⚡

Major news 🚨 

Introducing Bilt Cash. Bilt’s underwhelming Milestone Rewards are being replaced in 2026 by Bilt Cash. You will earn $50 in Bilt Cash for every 25,000 Bilt points earned. Bilt Cash can be redeemed within the Bilt universe on things like Bilt portal hotel bookings, Bilt Dining restaurant bills, Bilt Home Delivery, and more. The cash can also be used to buy your way up to higher-level status benefits, like one-time upgrades in Bilt elite status to take advantage of elevated Rent Day transfer bonuses. Some details TBD, but overall this looks like a win-win: a big boost in concrete value for engagement with the Bilt universe. (Bilt)

Citi cleans up its Strata Elite mess. The issuer locked many new cardholders’ accounts, interfering with their opportunity to use the card’s credits or earn the sign up bonus. Citi is crediting the bonus and essentially refunding the fee, albeit after some bad press. (Frequent Miler)

Amex may be loosening its restrictions on welcome bonuses. We’ve written about the once-per-lifetime rule, but they may be lightening up. (Thrifty Traveler)

No more passport stamps in Europe. Growing up, I never dreamed I’d have a passport, let alone one with so many stamps in it. Europe’s new electronic system will mean higher fees, and one less souvenir. (TPG)

New products and features 🆕

Don’t forget to use your credits. That’s the name of the site, which helps you find locations and deals to use your premium card benefits like dining and shopping credits. (ThiftyTraveler)

United and Air Canada roll out new Apple boarding passes. They can help you find your luggage, navigate the airport, and live flight information. (TPG)

More value 📈

“Cash” back and rewards for frequent Lyft users. Set your Lyft Cash balance to automatically reload and you’ll get 2-5% Lyft Cash back per ride, plus your partner rewards. (Lyft)

Bilt adds bonus points for parking. Earn an extra Bilt point per dollar when parking with Metropolis. (Bilt)

25% transfer bonus from Chase to Southwest. Transfer bonuses on domestic airlines are pretty rare, so this is interesting. Rapid Reward points aren’t the best, but with this bonus they could be a decent option for domestic flights. (AwardWallet) 

New partnerships 🤝

Earn and redeem JetBlue points with United and vice-versa. Loyalty benefits for elites are coming next year. (JetBlue) 

Nerdy 🤓

Get cheap United flights with Maharaja Club. Short-haul domestic from 3,500 miles, transferable from Mesa and Rove. (Daily Drop)  

Sign-up bonus of the Week 🎯

Chase’s $95-fee, Marriott co-branded Boundless is offering 125,000 + 1 free night after spending $3,000 within three months of account opening. The free night is redeemable for up to 50,000 points. This bonus is the best ever on this card, and well above what we’ve seen on this card over the past few years.

Marriott Bonvoy points pricing is all over the place in my experience—we stayed at a beautiful AC Hotel in Valencia last year for 14,500 points, and I can often find nice properties under 25,000, but sometimes it can be hard to find anything under 50,000 points per night. If you are frugal and selective, though, I think this bonus could be stretched to a week or more in stays. 

As for the card itself, it’s underwhelming. You get a free night each year (up to 35,000 points, which can be topped up) and Silver status (which is basically nothing). It’s a fairly solid card to have in your wallet—maybe even a keeper—thanks to the free night, and provides a decent discount on Marriott stays, although it earns so poorly on non-Marriott purchases that you likely wouldn’t want to use it on anything else. But for a solid card with a bonus like this? 🔥🔥

Other great current bonuses

100k points + 25k companion certificate on the Alaska Atmos Summit (our take: 🔥🔥🔥🔥) (ending soon)

100k points on the Citi Strata Elite (our take: 🔥🔥🔥)

125k points on the Chase Sapphire Reserve (our take: 🔥🔥🔥)

80-125k miles on Delta credit cards (our take: 🔥🔥) (ends 10/29)

75k points on the Chase Sapphire Preferred (our hot take: 🔥)

80k points on the Atmos Ascent (our take: 🔥) (ending soon)

80k points on the JetBlue Plus (our take: 🔥)

100k Avios on Chase cards (our take: 🔥)

Enjoy the weekend! 🦥

Get that passport stamped while you still can.

Some links in this newsletter are referral links—if you use them, I may receive a bonus or commission. I only include them when I believe they’re the best current offer and a genuinely good deal. Still, always double-check for the best offer and consider a card’s history. Thanks for supporting LazyPoints 🦥.