Amex Turns Gen Z Loyalty Into an AI Advantage

American Express’ second-quarter earnings tell a spending story that stretches from restaurant tables to airport gates to corporate expense accounts, with artificial intelligence sitting somewhere in the middle.

Card spending rose 9% on an FX-adjusted basis in the second quarter, according to a Friday (July 24) earnings presentation. Travel and entertainment spending increased 10%, goods and services rose 9%, and consumer spending in the United States climbed 11%, its fastest growth since early 2018 excluding pandemic-distorted periods. Commercial spending, which has been considerably slower, accelerated to 5%.

The spending was broad-based across categories. Retail spending rose 13%, restaurant spending increased 10%, airlines were up 10%, and American Express travel bookings jumped 22%. Millennials and Generation Z remained the fastest-growing U.S. consumer cohorts and now account for the largest share of U.S. consumer spending on Amex cards.

CEO Stephen Squeri said during an analyst Q&A on a Friday conference call that the spending gains reflect more than new customer acquisition.

“Engagement has been really accelerated, and that’s driving a lot of the spending,” Squeri said, adding that “restaurant spend was up 10%, but when you look at Resy restaurant spend, it’s double that.”

The engagement is increasingly coming from young customers. Gen Z spending rose 40% year over year, compared with 14% for millennials, 10% for Generation X and 5% for baby boomers and older customers. Millennials and Gen Z together accounted for 38% of U.S. consumer-billed business. Meanwhile, 65% of new global consumer accounts came from those two generations.

The income story is more nuanced. Chief Financial Officer Christophe Le Caillec said during the call that young customers generally enter the Amex franchise with low income initially, but “we’re going to grow with them, and they’re going to grow with us.”

Restaurants Become More Than a Card Category

Dining is also becoming a deliberate part of Amex’s strategy.

Restaurant spending is the company’s largest travel and entertainment category, and Amex is building infrastructure around that spending rather than simply collecting interchange when the check arrives. Its proposed acquisition of TheFork would add 50,000 restaurants across 11 European countries to a dining portfolio that already includes Resy and Tock.

Squeri said Amex is effectively creating smaller closed loops inside its larger payments network by connecting cardholders directly with restaurants. Amex cardholders also generate higher average tickets than non-cardholders. The platforms can additionally serve as acquisition channels by offering cardholders special access and benefits while remaining open to nonmembers.

The closed-loop argument becomes more consequential as commerce starts shifting toward AI agents.

Squeri said agentic commerce creates new questions around fraud, customer intent and AI hallucinations. Amex’s pitch is that it has information from both sides of a transaction.

“We know what the customer wanted to do, and we’ll also know what the merchant delivered,” he said during the call.

However, he cautioned against assuming agentic commerce is already mature.

“We’re sort of in the preseason,” Squeri said. “We’re not even … in the early innings.”

Amex is spending accordingly. Squeri said technology investment now includes agentic commerce initiatives that were not contemplated when the company established its original 2026 spending plans.

The business side is getting similar attention. Commercial billed business rose 5%, with U.S. small- to medium-sized businesses and large/global corporations growing at the same rate. Travel and entertainment spending among commercial customers rose 8%, twice the 4% increase in goods and services spending. Amex has also begun piloting a new expense management platform with middle-market customers, an area where management acknowledged competitive pressure from FinTech providers.

CFO Le Caillec said the stronger spending translated into 10% revenue growth, a rate that was below Wall Street’s expectations, and shares dipped 5% in early trading Friday. The company raised its full-year revenue growth forecast from a range of 9% to 10% to 10%.