Author: matt

Introduction

I’m not a financial advisor and I’m definitely not your financial advisor, but I get questions almost every week about my investment strategies for reasons known only to Betty Badluck. My best advice: seek a low cost total market index fund and HODL. Of course this isn’t that kind of blog though, but there is a travel hacking angle here so: Hey, how you doin? Let’s chat!

My Strategy

My investments fit a simple allocation strategy, and I rebalance my portfolio every three or so months to make sure that the allocation stays proportional:

  • 45% VTI
  • 45% VEU
  • 10% MEAB special

What’s the MEAB special? It’s stocks that I pick individually for some particular reason, but proportionally allocated in a way such that a catastrophically bad pick won’t be able able to wipe out the majority of my holdings. Historically that 10% generally outperforms the rest, but I attribute that to luck moreso than skill and don’t expect that it’ll continue that way.

The Travel Hacking Angle

There’s always a travel hacking angle, right? Well, as frequent flyer hackers we get an inside view into the operations, rise, and fall of airlines in both a specific and general sense. For me, that means that I have an insider view into how an airline performs that goes above and beyond the information in a 10-Q, and if I’m going to be choosing an airline to hold in the 10% MEAB special, that information may or may not give me an edge.

To be clear: investing in airlines is a tough business and I don’t recommend it, but if you do it, augment the public filings with information you’ve got from your inside view.

Finally, to answer the question that exactly none of you asked: When I invest in the airline industry I short one airline stock and long another airline stock to try and earn based on relative performance while avoiding losses from general industry crapluence. Sometimes it works too, probably just like sometimes a broken analog clock is right.

MEAB’s investment skill.

  1. Giftcards.com’s promotion that was originally 5% back and set to expire on June 17 has risen from the dead. The current zombie variant is 10% back on up to $1,500 in $100 Visa gift cards with promo code SUMMER or YAYSUMMER through tomorrow evening.

    Giftcards.com remains absent from airline portals, but it’s still available via Rakuten and the Capital One Shopping. The Capital One mobile app almost always has the highest rate. These are Pathward gift cards.
  2. Kroger.com has $10 off of $150 or more in Visa and Mastercard gift cards with promo code JUNE2023 through Wednesday evening, but unfortunately the limit is one per account. You will earn fuel points which adds another $10 off or so if you can use the points.

    These are US Bank gift cards.
  3. There are a few offers that combine for a great deal at Staples this week:

    – Fee free $200 Visa gift cards through Saturday, limit eight per transaction
    – A Chase offer for 10% back at Staples up to $220 in spend through July 10

    These are Pathward gift cards. (Thanks to DoC)
  4. The Capital One Venture card has a 100,000 points (effectively $1,000) after $5,000 in spend in three months. Note that you’ll be automatically denied for this card if you have a Venture X personal card, but the jury is still out on the business Venture X.
  5. Meijer MPerks has a promotion for 50,000 MPerks points with the purchase of $250 or more in many third party gift cards (but especially Apple), limit 50,000 points per account.

    Scale this one with multiple MPerks accounts.

The moment the giftcards.com SUMMER deal came back from the dead.

I’ve received nearly a half dozen reports of clawbacks of American Express Membership Rewards regular spend, +5x referral bonus, and sign-up bonus on Tuesday and Wednesday, and I’ve seen corroborating data-points publicly and privately too. This isn’t happening silently, but rather those affected are notified by email with the message:

After careful review, we noticed activity that indicated these points may have been earned or used in a way that doesn’t meet the terms and conditions of the Membership Rewards program or of the promotional offer under which you earned the points.

Based on conversations with AmEx customer service reps, American Express has tagged certain purchases as gift card purchases and reversed the points earned and the some of the bonuses awarded based on that spend, since the AmEx terms and conditions exclude “cash equivalents” from earning. We’ve seen clawbacks on the following types of purchases:

  • Some Speedway purchases that are a near multiples of $505.95, but not all
  • Some Walmart purchases that are a near multiple of $504.90, but not all
  • Some giftcards.com purchases, but not all
  • Some grocery in-person gift card purchases (various chains), but not all

Clawbacks have happened on (at least) Business Gold cards, Business Platinum cards, Blue Business Plus cards, and Personal Gold cards. Other than earning Membership Rewards, bonus categories and card types probably don’t play a factor in whatever’s happening.

There’s some less-bad news too though:

  • It seems that clawbacks have only happened on some cards, even if multiple cards could have been affected
  • It seems that clawbacks are happening specifically on cards in the sign-up bonus period or in a +5x referral period
  • All clawbacks seem to be for late-May or June spend
  • So far it looks like American Express is only targeted cardholders that closed a card in the last month or so (even if it wasn’t the same card)

If you’re working on a sign-up bonus in the near future, I’d try an avoid spending in suspiciously obvious amounts at big-named retailers which seems to help, and be careful about when you close any AmEx card. Good luck!

(Thanks to Tyler, D73, SideShowBob233, Brooke, and Brandon for collaborating with me on this post)

Pictured: AmEx.

1. PSA: You’ve essentially got today and tomorrow to spend your first half 2023 American Express Dell and Saks credits because neither posts charges before items ship, and shipping delays are common with both. In the case of Saks, I believe it’s just because they’re a legacy company that’s still working on its digital supply chain chops. For Dell it can only be because so clearly and obviously they hate their customers.

To juice the Dell side, Rakuten currently has 10x earning at Dell and 2x at Saks.

2. Tap Air Portugal has a 15% transfer bonus added to incoming Capital One mile transfers through June 30. Sweet spots for US travelers:

– The Caribbean, Central America, and South America in business
– Europe in economy
– Open jaws within a region (regions are big in this program)

This program can also be a reasonable way to have open jaw award tickets purely in North America on United metal, provided that you can find United availability. (Thanks to FM)

3. Kroger has a 4x fuel points promotion on third party gift cards and fixed value Visa and Mastercard gift cards running Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Resale markets continue to be strong even after running the same promotion for the last two full weeks ending on Tuesday.

Happy Thursday!

Kroger’s newest third party gift card product, ripe for resale.

Introduction

There are multiple grey markets for frequent flyer miles and bank points, and just like any other market, you’ll find that different items have different prices (shocker, I know).

Obviously you can use this to your advantage in myriad ways, but let’s talk about what I’d call the travel hacker equivalent of the bull call spread in the derivates market:

The Goal

Let’s say you need to book an AA flight with 7,500 British Airways Avios and you’ve got Ultimate Rewards points ready to go. Of course you could transfer Ultimate Rewards to Avios directly, but that’s not always the best option.

Running the Spread

To illustrate, let’s assume a few spot prices for miles:

  • Ultimate Rewards: 1.27 cents per point
  • ThankYou Points: 1.15 cents per point
  • Membership Rewards: 1.18 cents per point

With those prices in mind, here’s the play:

  • Sell 7,500 Ultimate Rewards at 1.27 cents per point (earn: $95.25)
  • Buy 7,500 Membership Rewards at 1.18 cents per point (pay: $88.50)
  • Transfer the Membership Rewards to British Airways and keep the spread ($6.75)

Is this with your time and the risk for earning enough to buy a decked out Starbucks latte? Almost certainly not. But if you’re talking the number of points needed for La Premier tickets for a couple or JAL F tickets for a family instead of a measly 7,500 Avios, the difference can be significant and may be enough to move the needle.

Caveats

There are potential pitfalls here: banks don’t want you buying and selling points, markets aren’t always fully liquid, and you have counterparty risk. You’re all adults though right? Just make sure those risks are priced-in should you decide to run the spread.

Happy Wednesday!

A guide to a modestly priced Starbucks latte, pre-inflation.

  1. Meijer stores have a bonus 10,000 MPerks points with $100 or more in Happy, Choice, or One4All gift cards through Saturday, limit one per MPerks account. Many of these can be swapped to high resale value brands like Home Depot or BestBuy. In case you don’t want the Meijer gift card, save a few of them and buy electronics for a buyer’s group or to sell on Facebook Marketplace. (Thanks to GCG, and thanks to Nuhertz)
  2. Do this now: Register for Hyatt’s summer promotion, double points on properties outside of the Americas from July 1 through September 15. Bonus earning starts on the second stay.
  3. Albertsons, Safeway, and Vons stores have $15 off of your next purchase when you buy a $75 gift card in multiple brands starting tomorrow and running through Tuesday of next week. The interesting brands for manufactured spend are Lowes, Macys, and Arby’s. Ok, ok, I’m lying about one of those, can you guess which?

    Also, apropos of nothing Safeway gift cards are available at Amazon after an extended absence so let the games begin. (Thanks to DoC)

I’ve helpfully shared this Arby’s marketing photo to remind you about what you’ve been missing.

  1. Citi ThankYou points has a 15% transfer bonus to Cathay Pacific AsiaMiles through July 22. Sweet spots:

    – JAL award flight availability before most partners can see the award space
    – Trips with up to five (!) stopovers and 2 open-jaws
    – Qatar Q-Suites for 75,000 miles each way
    – East coast to Europe in business class for 50,000 miles each way
  2. The Citi Shop Your Way Rewards Card has been sending targeted offers for online spend through July 14. In my experience online spend is the same as a “card not present” transaction, so it’s easy to hit. Offers:

    -$50 statement credit with $750 spend
    – $30 statement credit with $500 spend
    – 150,000 Shop Your Way Rewards Points with $500 spend
    – 225,000 Shop Your Way Rewards Points with $750 spend

    These stack with other grocery, gas, and restaurant offers that are running concurrently. Also, yes it’s possible to knock some or all of those out online.
  3. Data points have been piling up for months that it’s possible to get unbanned from Citi. The key? Clean up that credit report.

Happy Monday!

Citi’s new “Citi Bits” cereal looks and tastes exactly as bad as you’d expect.

  1. The American Express Delta personal and business cards both have increased offers, but the business ones are the juicier versions and don’t affect 5/24:

    – Business Gold: 70,000 SkyMiles after $3,000 spend in three months
    – Business Platinum: 90,000 SkyMiles after $4,000 spend in three months
    – Business Reserve: 100,000 SkyMiles after $6,000 spend in three months

    Yes, Delta SkyMiles can suck, and yes, they can be great too. Don’t use them for business class out of the US and you’ll probably get decent value, and worst case co-brand cardholders can use pay with miles for a floor of 1 cent per mile.
  2. Staples continues the endless stream of office supply store gift card deals with fee-free $200 Mastercard gift cards starting Sunday and running through Saturday of next week, limit eight per transaction.

    Call me a rebel but I prefer the Mastercards, even if they’re issued by Pathward like these.
  3. There’s a 20% Ultimate Rewards transfer bonus to Air Canada Aeroplan through July 31. Aeroplan is now arguably the best Chase airline transfer partner for international trips even without the bonus, so the 20% is icing on the cake.

    I wouldn’t transfer speculatively though: you’ve got a month and a half to transfer and book trips, and if that doesn’t work out another bonus will show up soon enough.
  4. The Chase IHG Business card has a sign-up bonus of 165,000 points after spending $3,000 in the first three months. I know some of y’all like the recently increased Chase Marriott bonus offers, but I’d take this $99 annual fee card and bonus over those any day. Now we just need to lobby to bring back IHG PointBreaks.

Office supply stores reflecting on gift card sales this year.