Amex Black Card Added Major New Benefit + NEW Transfer BONUSES

The American Express Black Card. It's one of the most prestigious credit cards in the world. That's a Black American Express card, right? I don't know whether you know this, but you have to earn... it's a ridiculous amount of money per year to get one of those. I bet you haven't got one. Amex does no marketing for this card, but if you spend enough on your Amex Platinum, you might just get an invite. And today, Amex has just announced a new benefit on the Black Card worth $1,000 per year. We'll tell you about it in this video. Then, for Amex Gold, Platinum or Green card members and also Centurion Black Card members, we have two new transfer bonuses that are now live on the American Express website. One for a popular hotel chain and one for an airline. And we also have another transfer bonus from Capital One to a certain airline to talk about too. So stick around for that as well, since most of you in the audience will actually be able to access those offers. Hey Credit Warriors, welcome to the show. My name is Ben Hedges, aka The Credit Shifu, and on this channel, I cover US credit cards, personal finance, and luxury travel. If you like the sound of that, please subscribe, but let's get into it. And this video is brought to you by Monarch, but more on that later. So the Amex Black Card has a $5,000 annual fee and a $10,000 initiation fee, meaning you pay them $15,000 in your first year and then $5,000 each year after that. They need that $10,000 to sign you up for the Illuminati. Now for the annual fee though, you do get a load of high-end hotel and airline statuses like Hilton Diamond and Delta Platinum are probably the two most significant. There are also coupon book style credits like the $3,600 credit for Equinox All Access Membership. This gets you into almost all Equinox locations across the US. Pretty useful actually. And you do get clear membership and you previously got a $1,000 SACS credit divided up into $250 per quarter. But since SACS has now gone bankrupt, so like with the Platinum Card SACS credit, the SACS credit on the Black Card has now gone as of July 1st. They deleted this from their terms and conditions since it's obviously after July 1st now. So a lot of people in blogs and stuff writing about this are missing this fact. But if you search for the SACS credit on the Centurion Card on Google, you can actually still see a reference to it ending on July 1st in data from previous crawls of their site picked up by Google's AI. But anyway, so the SACS credit has gone and Amex has very quickly replaced it with something else. Let's now look at what they've replaced it with. So the old SACS credit has been replaced with the exact same deal, $1,000 per year, $250 per quarter, but for Resi restaurants. So you can use it at over 10,000 US restaurants and Resi events and also for dining at the Centurion New York. Centurion New York is Amex's Black Card members lounge in Manhattan, and actually Platinum Card holders can get access to some of the areas in the lounge, but not the whole thing. It's really aimed at Black Card members. At the lounge, you will find fine dining and amazing views of the city, perfect for business meetings when you want to impress a client or dates when you want to impress a lady. Now the Platinum Card also has a Resi credit, but it is for $100 per quarter. Under most situations, that won't fully cover a meal for two at a Resi restaurant, but $250 per quarter definitely would. For me, that would actually probably cover a meal for four. But then don't forget, Centurion Card members are most likely going to be spending a lot more on each meal since they're all high net worth individuals. But I think it's better benefit than the SACS credit. People with the Centurion Card are definitely going to traveling to areas where there are a lot of Resi restaurants, like New York, LA, or San Francisco, etc. So I'm sure it will be easier to use than the SACS credit. One final point is that the Centurion Card has also lost its $200 airline credit as well. So technically, you're getting a total of $200 less value now. But I don't think that Centurion Card members are really counting the pennies and probably ease of use with the Resi credit versus the SACS credit and no airline credit would win out. All right, let's now move on to some bonuses that all Amex cardholders can take advantage of. But first, we are all about financial literacy on this channel. And I really value being able to create a clear budget so I can see exactly where my money is going each month. But I need a system that can pull transactions from all of my 15 credit cards and also knows how much income is coming in across all my banks, brokerages and crypto accounts. Well, Monarch can do all that. It is a financial planning app that syncs with over 13,000 financial institutions. So you can create a 100% clear picture of your finances. I can set budgets for different categories of spending. And as you're setting it up, Monarch shows you the most recent few months for that category. So you can set a realistic goal. So let's say 300 for gas, then 300 for restaurants and bars. Looking at those previous months, maybe that's wishful thinking. Once you're set up, you'll be able to view your entire budget and see how much you have left in each category or if you've gone over. And you'll also now get AI powered insights about unusual spending, spending increases or other noteworthy items. For credit cards, you'll be able to see all of your balances in one place and how much of your credit limit you're using. And if you have credit card debt, having all your credit card balances in one app also lets you know whether you are truly paying down debt or just moving it from one card to another. Monarch is private and ad free. You are the customer, not the product. They're not selling your data to third parties. You have both mobile and desktop versions with everything displayed in one clean dashboard. And it's couples friendly. So my wife can log in too and get a complete picture of our shared finances. So a big thank you to Monarch for partnering with me. Scan the QR code on screen now or click the link below to start your free trial. And my viewers will also get 50% off their first year with code Ben 50. So currently we have two exciting transfer bonuses that just launched for members of any Amex membership rewards earning card, i.e. green, gold, platinum or centurion. I left my centurion at home. These are transfer bonuses, which is when a card company gives you an extra percentage of points when you transfer to a certain airline or hotel partner. For example, 20% extra would mean that you transfer over 1000 Amex points and you get 1200 in your hotel or airline partner account. These bonuses were actually previously activated on Amex's site very briefly last week and then suddenly pulled. I made a video about it last week. Looks like that. But it just seems that what happened is that they were activated in people's accounts just a few days early. But they were actually supposed to go live on July 1st. Now, they weren't online when I checked yesterday morning, but they are now. So they must have gone live a little bit later in the day yesterday. Let's actually check them out. First, we have a bonus for Hilton. It's a 20% bonus, but Hilton points normally transfer at a 1 to 2 ratio. So this means that you will be now getting a 1 to 2.4 ratio, which is a pretty good rate. In other words, 1000 Amex points become 2400 Hilton points in your Hilton account. The Hilton one is active for two weeks until July 14th. Then we have another one for Virgin Atlantic, and this one is for 30%. So with the regular transfer ratio of 1 to 1, that means 1000 Amex points now become 1300 Virgin miles. And this one is active until July 31st. So you have four weeks to use this one. Virgin Atlantic is a member of Sky Team Alliance, which means that you can book any other airline in that alliance, including Delta. You can also fly Virgin to the UK, although flying direct to the UK tends to have big surcharges. So it isn't normally the best use of miles. Upgraded points has a great article on the best uses for Virgin miles. I'll paste it down below in a pinned comment for you to check out. All right, so those are two Amex transfer bonuses active right now, but we do actually have one more rare transfer bonus, and that would be with Capital One. So Capital One is offering a 30% transfer bonus to Ever Air. And I say Ever Air, I think actually when they make the announcements, they call it EVA Airways. Welcome on board EVA Air. But I think Ever Air rolls off the tongue a little bit better because it comes from Evergreen, right? The shipping company, this is their airline. So Evergreen, Ever, why would you say EVA? I don't know. Anyway, this is an airline based in Taiwan, which provides a good way to get to Taiwan or many Asian destinations, obviously with a stop in Taiwan to change planes along the way. Now, Ever Air is kind of an odd one out with Capital One, since it's normally just a 1000 to 750 transfer ratio. But this 30% bonus bumps that up to 1000 to 975. So I would say that's as good as one to one, right? It's almost there. It's basically that their business class product on Ever Air is really good. It's considered one of the best in Asia. They're also in Star Alliance. So in theory, you can book any airline in Star Alliance, which includes United if you're looking for a US airline. So to do this, you'll need to sign up for their loyalty program, which is called Infinity Mileage Lands, which it's a really weird name, right? They probably didn't hire a consultant to tell them what sounds good in English when they thought that up. But anyway, yeah, you'll sign up for their program. And then as long as you have a Capital One card like the Capital One Venture X, Venture, etc, that has some Capital One miles in the account, you will be able to And that bonus runs until July 31. So if you're interested, you have a month to do it. Remember, guys, with all of these, especially the airline ones, I only recommend transferring once you actually have a flight with availability that you want to book. With Hilton hotels, I may transfer over even if I don't have anything planned just to get that good rate, since I can pretty much always find a use for Hilton points, right? Whether it's a weekend away or going to Vegas and staying at the Conrad at Resorts World or whatever, I can pretty much always find a use for them. Alright guys, that's the video for today. Don't forget to check out Monarch in the description below or by scanning the QR code on screen now. You can get a free trial and you can use my code BEN50 for 50% off when your free trial ends. Please subscribe to our channel if you're new. I'll see you next time. Bye bye.