Smerri

This is definitely to bad. With this devaluation, think I'm going to hold off the AmEx Platinum app and stick with my Citi Prestige.

mia

Which ThankYou Rewards transfer partner (or other redemption) will give you better value?

TMM1982

The previous poster said nothing about transfer ratios. The said they were going to hold off on AMEX Plat while sticking with Citi Prestige. That makes sense from a point earning perspective as its much easier to earn points with Prestige for travel and dining than it is with the AMEX Plat.

On top of that, AMEX MR has shown a recent trend of becoming a poorer value while the arrow for Citi TYP is pointing straight up. One program is worsening while one program is improving. If you want to bet on a regression to the mean, feel free to stick with AMEX. Smart money is on Citi.

Enjoy your Avios.

mia

I have both cards. I did not express a preference. I asked a question. I am still interested in the answer.

username

Another word, if you transfer by 1 October, you are getting a 25% bonus

Yeah, this is not good.

mia

Agreed, but it's odd that BA chose to increase points required for many awards -and- decrease the standard earnings rate for (some) credit cards, rather than merely eliminating transfer bonuses, and restricting new card account bonuses. Those changes don't require any announcement, and wouldn't drive in incremental transfers in advance of the effective date. This type of change will make award availability worse in 2016.

Dieuwer

Too BA centric. See it from AMEX point of view.

aza72

From AmEx's 2014 annual report
Total MR liability was 6.5 billion. So MR reward liability was 5% higher due to better estimates. Perhaps they are just trying to bring the MR liability back down. A little harder to speculate on the BA side. Their program is managed by Avios Group Ltd, a sister subsidiery of International Airlines Group, but unlike US companies, their annual filings are not freely available online...

TMM1982

Doubtful

mia

Which is?

Dieuwer

Make money by: getting more people to sign up for their cards and use them.

PDX Duck

With the recent decrease from 1.25 Avios per dollar to 1 Avios per dollar, on the British Airways Visa, there was no reason to continue to hold the BA Visa if you could get the same 1 Avios per dollar transfer from MR. The Amex Premier Rewards Gold is even better, if you do a lot of spending at grocery stores and gas stations, where you get 2x MR, and airlines where you get 3x MR. Since I have both cards, I had thought about dropping the BA Visa, when they dropped the earning to 1 Avios per dollar. Now that MR has dropped their conversion rate, I think I will hold on to both cards (which is exactly what both card issuers wanted.)

The decrease in the MR conversion rate was not surprising and I am almost positive we will see a similar decrease in the conversion rate in the other programs (Starwood, etc...)

entropy

its a bit surprising, given the devaluation of Avios in general, and the relative frequency of bonus offers, but I guess those will probably dry up.

riversidetom

so a logical assumption then that there won't be a transfer bonus MR -> BA this year?

seems like a ridiculous question to ask but yet I asked it.

aza72

Not a ridiculous question, but I would say there is no way to tell. It's a complicated system with three parties, all have competing interests, and we don't know what goes on at the negotiating table.

Consider:

• Avios Group Limited/British Airways
  British Airways wants to sell as many miles as possible for as high a price as possible. Selling miles is great for their cashflow, and if they sell them to chase, and people get them as part of a sign up bonus or through credit card spend (unlike a direct transfer) they might not use them right away. This might be part of the strategy of offering transfer bonuses - if they work with AmEx to have a short term transfer bonus, and say charge AmEx less per Avio, then they make money from AmEx and people load up their account with Avios that could possibly expire.
  
• AmEx
  American Express has a whole bunch of MR points on their balance sheet, these show up as a liability, and they would like to get them off the balance sheet for as little as possible. Last year they underestimated this liability, so likely want to keep the costs under control. If BA is increasing the price they are charging, or if Avios cost more than say Aeroplan miles, they might increase the cost to discourage the transfer, while still being able to list BA as a transfer partner.
  
• Chase
  Chase offers the cobranded BA card in the US. They reasonably want to have as exclusive as possible relationship with BA, to increase the scarcity of Avios and make their cards more valuable. (ie if someone wants a 50K avios sign on bonus, they have to sign up for a chase card and not an AmEx card). They will be using their weight to make the transfer ratio at AmEx worse, which they can do by putting pressure on BA to increase the rate they charge AmEx, or by negotiating some sort of favored nation status. Chase already reduced the earning rate of Avios on the BA card back in March. Though again, who knows what that means?

Anyway, that's just a lot of speculation, but the point is that we have no idea which one(s) of these parties are responsible for the shift. Could be AmEx trying to cut costs, could be BA trying to raise revenues, could be Chase trying to maintain an exclusive relationship.

If it's AmEx or BA, then I wouldn't rule out the possibility of future transfer bonuses. If it's Chase, I think future transfer bonuses are highly unlikely.