By PYMNTS | October 23, 2026
Highlights
American Express announced a restructuring targeting 5% of global positions.
Gen Z spending rose 35% in the third quarter, according to management commentary.
Outside AI agents face access controls, remarks from an earnings call documented.
American Express is cutting management layers and expanding artificial intelligence across customer service and commerce, with rules governing how outside agents reach customers’ accounts and benefits.
According to a Friday (Oct. 23) third-quarter earnings presentation and management commentary on an earnings call, the company expects to eliminate approximately 5% of positions globally following a $336 million restructuring charge. American Express Chairman and CEO Steve Squeri said leadership teams were asked to streamline their organizations and speed decision-making. He described AI’s productivity benefits separately, without attributing the full reduction to automation.
American Express launched its first conversational AI voice agents and is using AI to help employees resolve service issues and investigate complaints and disputes. Its plans also extend to how customers discover products, make reservations and authorize purchases.
“We need to protect our customer and merchants, and we’re only going to allow agents access to our systems that are either approved through API or MCP channels,” Squeri said during Friday’s analyst Q&A.
Consumers Keep Spending on Experiences
Consumer spending remained stronger than business spending. Consumer purchases in the United States rose 9.4%, with discretionary categories contributing to growth.
“Restaurant spending continues to be high,” Squeri said. “It was up 9%. It is the largest T&E category. Resy restaurants were up 18%.”
Across American Express, airline spending increased 13%, while goods and services purchases grew 7%. Chief Financial Officer Christophe Le Caillec said Amazon Prime Day and other retail promotions shifted some purchasing into the second quarter.
The presentation showed the demographic trends. U.S. consumer spending increased 35% among Generation Z cardholders, 11% among millennials, 8% among Generation X and 4% among baby boomers and older customers.
Commercial spending rose 3%, or 5% excluding exited small business co-brand portfolios. Business travel and entertainment purchases grew 7%, compared with 2% for goods and services.
Squeri acknowledged that middle-market performance didn’t meet expectations.
“We have not grown the way we want to grow, and that is why we did the Center acquisition,” he said.
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American Express is combining expense management, corporate cards and banking services to compete with Ramp and Brex. Squeri said these competitors have addressed demand for automation and expense management. Amex plans to introduce more agents into its platform and make the capabilities available to existing business customers.
AI Raises Questions About Access and Costs
Dining illustrated both Amex’s ambitions and the controls it expects to impose. Resy restaurant discovery and reservations launched in ChatGPT earlier this year. Amex is also working with OpenAI on a plugin for discovering and enrolling in Amex Offers.
Squeri said agents shouldn’t repeatedly query Resy and disadvantage other cardholders seeking reservations.
Analysts also questioned whether AI would help customers maximize rewards and increase Amex’s benefit costs. Squeri said it was too early to determine the expense impact.
Squeri said he expects AI tools to help American Express detect gaming and adjust benefits, while greater customer engagement supports spending.
Le Caillec reported revenue growth of 9% to $20.1 billion and reaffirmed the full-year revenue growth outlook of 10%. He said he expects customer engagement expense growth to moderate as American Express passes the anniversary of its Platinum refresh.
Agentic payment volumes remain small. American Express is developing purchase-intent authentication and protection for eligible purchases when registered agents share intent data and make mistakes. Squeri described what these payments will require.
“The transaction of the future will carry more than a payment credential,” Squeri said. “It will carry context.”
Shares were down 2% in early trading Friday.