American Express (AXP) FY2025 results: revenue $72.2 billion, up 9.5% on the year

American Express issues credit and charge cards, signs up the merchants that take them, and runs the network the transactions travel over. Its customers are consumers, small businesses, mid-sized companies and large corporations around the world. Alongside cards it offers travel, dining, lifestyle and expense management services, deposits and non-card lending, merchant processing, servicing and settlement, fraud prevention and point-of-sale marketing. Founded in 1850 and headquartered in New York, it was incorporated as a New York corporation in 1965. American Express Company and its principal operating subsidiary, American Express Travel Related Services Company, Inc., are bank holding companies supervised by the Federal Reserve. There are four reportable segments: U.S. Consumer Services, Commercial Services, International Card Services, and Global Merchant and Network Services.

Both ends of the transaction

Because the company issues cards and also acquires merchants, it sees information at both ends of a card transaction, which the filing contrasts with the bankcard networks. It supplements that with data obtained by contract from third-party issuers, merchant acquirers, processors and payment facilitators. That data feeds models used to reduce fraud and underwrite credit, and to target offers at Card Members and marketing services at merchants. The filing also notes work on generative artificial intelligence and on integrating its products into agentic commerce.

Issuing cards

Credit, charge and debit products are sold to consumers and commercial customers in the United States and abroad through three of the four segments. The stated aim is to attract high-spending, engaged, creditworthy customers, and the company charges an annual fee on many products to support the value carried on them. Card Members are given reasons to spend through Membership Rewards and Amex Offers, cash-back features, statement credits for purchases with partners, interest rates on deposits and participation in partner loyalty programmes, along with benefits such as lounge access, dining experiences, entertainment and travel and business services.

Merchants and the network

Global Merchant and Network Services signs merchants, sets the discount rate charged for accepting the card and handles merchant servicing, and it works with acquirers, processors and payment facilitators. Under the OptBlue programme those third parties contract directly with small merchants for card acceptance on the network and set their pricing themselves. The same segment sells fraud-prevention tools, marketing, data analytics and other services to merchants and partners. The network business licenses third-party banks and institutions in approximately 110 countries and territories to issue American Express-branded cards or to acquire local merchants. Worldwide processed volume, meaning spending on cards issued by third parties plus alternative payment solutions the company facilitates, was $227.2 billion in 2025, and there were 66.2 million cards-in-force issued by third parties at 31 December 2025.

Partners

Cobrand arrangements run with corporations including Delta Air Lines, Marriott International, British Airways and Hilton Worldwide Holdings. Cards are issued on the network by third-party banks, financial technology companies and other institutions including Coinbase and Credit Saison. Expense management integrations run with Emburse and SAP Concur, points can be spent at Amazon.com, and experiences come through Formula 1 and AEG Worldwide. The company also holds an equity investment in and commercial arrangements with Global Business Travel Group, Inc. Delta is the largest strategic partner: the Delta cobrand portfolio was approximately 13 percent of worldwide billed business and approximately 21 percent of worldwide Card Member loans at 31 December 2025, and the current agreement runs to the end of 2029.

How it earns and who works there

The model generates revenue primarily by driving spending on the cards and secondarily through finance charges and fees, and spending per card is higher on average than on competing networks. That spend, lend and fee income funds the rewards and benefits, which in turn attract Card Members, merchants and partners. The company employed approximately 76,800 people at 31 December 2025, approximately 25,900 of them in the United States and approximately 50,900 outside it.

From American Express's annual report on Form 10-K for the year ended 31 December 2025. The filing

Written from the 10-K filed 6 February 2026: read the full 10-K.