Originally Posted by jiejie

I can give an update on point. I just successfully completed a Gold Challenge between Dec 1 and Dec 20. New status is now in the system. Ticket was purchased from AA in China in Chinese yuan, using USA-based credit card. Travel was PEK-JAN and return. EQP's for the AA segments posted promptly and as per the rules, EQM's for AA and JL segments also posted correctly.

Prior to travelling and signing up for the Challenge, I had called AA to go over this and they assured me that the non-US currency purchase would still be valid for Challenge, subject to the normal Challenge rules. So, the experience posted by FT'er Argen-Tina in this thread must be some sort of strange aberration, or some other factor came into play in that particular case.