For example, the Bilt Obsidian would probably be a really competitive travel card if it had a real SUB. Competing with the likes of the Chase Sapphire Preferred, Citi Strata Premier, Capital One Venture, Wells Fargo Autograph Journey, and Bank of America Premium Rewards all in the $95 AF travel card niche, it’s massively held back by the fact that each and every single one of those cards has a bare minimum $600 value SUB while it has $200 of Bilt Cash that cannot even be redeemed 1:1 for cash value in any straightforwards way.
Bilt Blue likewise would crush the Chase Freedom Unlimited if not for the $100 Bilt Cash SUB holding it back against $200 to $250 of real cash from the CFU, more if the points are used well with transfer partners.
The PNC Cash Unlimited could match the Fidelity Rewards in several ways if it had its old $250 SUB back, as a no AF no FTF 2% catch-all from a major bank with nice protections and no nonsense to it.
The Charles Schwab Platinum and Morgan Stanley Platinum being stuck at static 80k MR offers is brutal, the opportunity cost against the regular Plat SUB is much too high to consider getting one of them first
Apple Card really needs a $200 SUB to be in the same league as other 2% card options if not a bit more
Aven Rewards is probably glossed over in part because of the lack of a true SUB measured against the risk of the whole operation collapsing within a year lol
Which credit cards do you think are held back the most by a terrible sign-up bonus?
byu/electronautix inCreditCards
Posted by electronautix
2 Comments
And yet, Cardless has more business than it can handle with the Bilt cards. So just how do you define “held back”?
The mere fact that a SUB is not as large as you would like it to be does not constitute a card being “held back.” Take it on faith that the banks know what they are doing, and that they calibrate SUBs to the amount of new business they want.
Ironically the regular Plat offers are now all at 12k spend and unclear if that will ever change. I cant seem to get a 175k offer, most ive gotten is 100k for $12k spend. At that point id rather have 80k for $8k and am considering the schwab plat