Citi’s Brand New American Airlines Globe Card Analyzed – Big Bonus Masks Strategic Missteps

American Airlines and Citibank have launched a new mid-tier credit card, the Citi® / AAdvantage®
Globe™ Mastercard®.

It’s the next stage of Project Falcon, Citibank’s program unifying AAdvantage card offerings under their roof. Already, onboard card applications have transitioned to Citi and Barclays AAdvantage cards are no longer available for new application. Here’s what to expect from the card.

Intro bonus: 90,000 AAdvantage bonus miles after $5,000 spend within the first four months of account opening.

American Airlines AAdvantage® bonus miles are not available if you have received a new account bonus for a Citi® / AAdvantage® Globe™ Mastercard® account in the past 48 months or if you converted another Citi credit card account on which you earned a new account bonus in the last 48 months into a Citi® / AAdvantage® Globe™ Mastercard® account.

Earning: 6x AAdvantage miles on AAdvantage Hotels bookings; 3x on American Airlines purchases; 2x on restaurants, taxis, rideshares and public transit. The card earns 1 Loyalty Point per dollar spent towards status. This is not strong return for your spend, except to the extent you’re trying to earn status and are aiming for the loyalty points.

Benefits:

• Four Admirals Club passes per calendar year (each valid for multiple clubs across 24 hours). I don’t value this because I have a membership via Citi’s Executive card. This is the mid-tier card, so some club access makes sense. Four passes is what Citi Strata Elite gets. As an existing club member I don’t love to see more cards offering more lounge access to more passengers, of course.

  The passes can be used for guests, but cannot be truly gifted as the cardmember must be present to use them. Unused passes expire at the end of each calendary year.

  
  American Airlines Admirals Club, Washington National E Concourse

• 5,000 bonus Loyalty Points every four qualifying American flights, up to 15,000 Loyalty Points per qualifying year. (Award travel does not qualify.)

  I find it so interesting that – as with the Citi Executive card – they moved away from awarding bonus Loyalty Points based on card spend. Presumably it has to do with the deal economics, perhaps Citi isn’t paying separately for these qualifying points, but it means there’s little incentive to actually spend money on the card. You get it for the benefits, not to use for spend. That seems like a strategic error on Citi’s part.

  
  American Airlines Airbus A321neo

• $100 annual Splurge Credit each calendar year with your choice of AAdvantage Hotels, 1stDibs, Future Personal Training, and Live Nation (choose up to two). I personally find this next to useless. However some use AAdvantage Hotels for Loyalty Points credit. You give up hotel points and hotel status when booking this way, though. And I have so many hotel credits from premium cards as it is.

  

• 10% discount on non-flight components of American Airlines Vacations travel packages booked at aavacations.com/citiaadvantage. There are people who will value this. I am not one of them. This should combine with the splurge credit, though.

  

• $99+tax Companion Certificate for a single roundtrip qualifying domestic coach trip within the contiguous 48 states (except for residents of Hawaii, Alaska, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands, although residents of Puerto Rico and USVI cannot apply for the card), each year after card renewal. There will be blackout dates and fare restrictions but I’ve gotten good savings from this on my Barclays card. No confirmable upgrades though.

  

• Up to $100 in annual inflight purchase credits each calendar year. This won’t benefit me as an Executive Platinum (free drinks in extra legroom for everyone anyway, one free drink if I’m not in extra legroom plus one free snack).

  Aviator Silver has had up to $25 back per day as statement credits on inflight food and beverage purchases. So $100 per year is nothing. Of course, American hasn’t had much to buy inflight and that seems to be slowly changing.

  

  

• First checked bag free on domestic American (marketed and operated) flights and group 5 preferred boarding for up to 8 companions on the same reservation. If you have status these benefit you not at all.

  

• Travel and purchase protections: Enhanced Trip Cancellation and Trip Interruption, Lost or Damaged Luggage, MasterRental® Coverage (Car Rental), Trip Delay, Extended Warranty and Purchase Assurance Plus.

• Global Entry/TSA PreCheck fee credit every four years. Since pretty much everyone offers this, there are only so many people whose Global Entry fees I can pick up. I value this at $0.

  

• $30 back per Turo rental, up to 8 times per year. This is basically Citi selling Turo access to its customers. Still, a good coupon for renting cars on the platform.

  

I am guessing that this new mid-tier card is what Barclays AAdvantage Aviator Silver cards will convert to, once those transition over to Citi. I have Aviator Silver. I’d like to get this one right away, then.

• Getting it now means I’d be eligible for the new cardmember bonus. Getting it post-transition I’d lose out on that opportunity.
  
• This way I might wind up with two of the cards. It’ll be interesting to see whether the annual 15,000 loyalty points can be earned twice with two cards (either earning 5,000 x 2 for every four qualifying American flights, or earning up to 30,000 instead of up to 15,000) though my guess would be no. Someone will have to be the guinea pig for how things work in practice.

This is a good card bonus. And it fills a gap in the card portfolio between the mass consumer card and the premium lounge membership card. Delta and United both have similarly-positioned cards in their cobrand stable.

The card’s initial bonus is an attractive reason to get it. The contribution towards status for people who fly American semi-frequently (at least 12 flights a year) is the main attraction in keeping it, I think. And the loyalty points earned are stackable with the ones earned with the Citi Executive card.

I hope to earn 20,000 with that card and 15,000 with this one – the terms and conditions are unclear over whether it’s possible to earn 15,000 from more than one of this one, however (i.e. whether I’ll keep earning 15,000 annually like I currently do spending on my Barclays Aviator Silver, if that card is eventually converted to an AAdvantage Globe card).