I suspect this has more to do with CX than AA. I have noticed that CX is now actively courting membership in its own program, rather than AA's as was the case when CP merged with AC, and CX offered us Plat status in AA, and lots of other mileage bonuses. Recently they have been promoting their own FF program with lots of route bonuses -- I am not aware of any actual status matching from AA or AC to get us to join up -- and other incentives.

I guess this balances the addition of BA's Canada-UK routes to AA mileage accumulation for Canadian AAdvantage members.