Breaking Points: Credit Card News

Bank of America launched a targeted referral program in late May 2026, initially making referral links available only through its mobile app. It now appears that eligible cardholders can generate referral links through the website as well. Referrals are not available to all customers and are currently limited to the Customized Cash Rewards, Premium Rewards, Travel Rewards, Unlimited Cash Rewards, and BankAmericard cards. Eligible cardholders can earn $100 per approved referral, up to five referrals per calendar year. To see if you have access to referrals, check here while logged in to your account. Hopefully this is a sign that Bank of America plans to expand referrals to additional cardholders and products in the future.

Chase Ultimate Rewards is offering a 30% transfer bonus to Virgin Atlantic Flying Club. The standard transfer ratio is 1:1, so with the bonus, you’ll receive 1,300 Virgin Atlantic Flying Club points for every 1,000 Chase Ultimate Rewards points transferred. Offer expires July 14, 2026.

Southwest is offering up to 40% off base fares with promo code FLYWOW. Book by June 11, 2026 for travel between August 4 and December 16, 2026. While there are some blackout dates and not every flight is eligible, we found the discount available on a wide variety of routes during our searches. The best part is that the discount applies to both cash fares and award flights, making this promotion useful whether you're paying with dollars or Rapid Rewards points.

We value Emirates miles at 0.9¢ each, which makes this promotion particularly interesting. Through August 31, 2026, Emirates is allowing members to redeem Skywards miles toward paid flights on Emirates, flydubai, EasyJet, and Jet2 at roughly 1.5¢ per mile. We generally prefer straightforward award redemptions, but Emirates' high surcharges and recent devaluations have made it increasingly difficult to get good value from Skywards miles. We wouldn't transfer points to Emirates solely to take advantage of this offer, but it could be a solid use if you have miles sitting with Emirates, especially if they are nearing expiration or you don't have a specific award redemption in mind.

Wells Fargo has announced several changes to its rewards program, the biggest of which is the elimination of point sharing between members. Beginning September 25, 2026, cardholders will no longer be able to gift points to another Wells Fargo Rewards member. That's disappointing news, as Wells Fargo now joins Citi and Amex in prohibiting members from combining or sharing transferable points. Wells Fargo is also ending automatic point pooling across multiple cards. Going forward, cardholders will need to manually combine points within their account, similar to how Chase and Capital One handle rewards. This minor change takes effect immediately.