Total spending volume on American Express corporate cards increased to $119.9 billion during the second quarter, up from $104 billion during the previous quarter and 45 percent higher than the Covid-19-ravaged second quarter of 2020, the payment giant reported on Friday.
Average quarterly cardmember spending for Amex's Global Commercial Services division also showed strong growth, reaching $8,180 in the second quarter, an increase of more than $1,000 from the first quarter, and 45 percent higher year over year. Meanwhile, the number of cards in force ticked up 1 percent year-over-year, to 14.8 million.
T&E-related spending comprised 18 percent of volume on all Amex cards worldwide in the second quarter, showing continued gains from 14 percent and 11 percent over the previous two quarters and nearing the typical pre-Covid share of around 25 percent of spending volume on all Amex cards.
Airline-related spending also showed continued improvement, inching up to comprise 3 percent of all second-quarter Amex card spending volume worldwide, compared with 2 percent in Q1 and statistically zero percent in the second quarter of 2020, when essentially all travel was grounded due to the Covid pandemic.
In the company's earnings call on Friday, American Express chairman and CEO Steve Squeri cited strong spending activity from small and midsize enterprises as a particularly buoying force for the GCS business unit overall, with SME-related volumes during the second quarter exceeding pre-pandemic levels.
"Global SME spending, which represents the bulk of our commercial billed business, remains the most resilient across all of our customer types with spend up 6 percent versus 2019 for the quarter," Squeri noted.
"All in all, a really good story on spending volumes," the Amex chairman said of the quarterly figures as a whole.