Customers at American Express, JPMorgan Chase and Capital One have racked up billions of dollars in unspent credit card points – but the value of those rewards is decaying.
The financial giants’ customers are sitting on a staggering $34 billion worth of unused rewards as of 2023, reports the Wall Street Journal, citing annual reports.
And the value of those rewards is falling due largely to inflation, as goods and services now require more points than they used to.
The end result is that someone who gathered 100,000 Capital One points in 2020 and left it alone now has a pile that’s effectively worth about 82,600 points.
Airlines and hotels have also quietly tweaked the number of points required for redemptions through dynamic pricing models, which tie prices to the current cash price.
Overall, the number of points or miles needed to book a flight has surged 28% since 2019, according to a study from the aviation consultancy firm IdeaWorks.
Financial firms have offered larger sign-up bonuses in recent years, but they’ve decided not to increase the value of points at large, which have long been centered at about 1 cent.
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