American Express Global Business Travel saw its revenue jump by 13 per cent to $674 million year-on-year during third quarter, as its sales were boosted by the acquisition of rival travel management company CWT.
Amex GBT completed its long-awaited $540 million takeover of CWT on 2 September after first announcing the deal in March 2024. CEO Paul Abbott called the integration of CWT an “important milestone for growth and value creation”.
The TMC’s third quarter results, released on Monday (10 November), showed that its “organic” revenue for Q3 rose by 3 per cent year-on-year, when excluding the impact of CWT’s addition to the business, which was “in line’ with previous expectations.
Amex GBT’s total transaction value was up by 23 per cent year-on-year from $7.8 billion to $9.5 billion, with the value of CWT’s travel sales accounting for around 60 per cent of this increase. The number of transactions also rose by 19 per cent following the acquisition, including organic growth of 4 per cent.
The company also more than halved its net loss for the quarter from $128 million in Q3 of 2024 to $62 million this year.
Abbott said the Q3 results “reflect strong execution within our core business and the acquisition of CWT”. He added that completing this deal “immediately grows our top line substantially”.
He also highlighted the impact of the recently announced partnership with SAP Concur in winning more clients in the coming years by offering new and expanded travel and expense platforms.
“We have multiple levers for growth and value creation ahead and material earnings milestones achieved, including the acquisition of CWT, a new strategic alliance with SAP Concur for travel and expense, the launch of a next-gen Egencia integrated travel and expense solution in Q1 2026, and the accelerating impact of AI on productivity and redefining the customer experience,” explained Abbott.
Abbott said he was “cautiously optimistic” about overall business travel demand in 2026, with customer surveys suggesting there could be “a moderate improvement in organic growth” next year.
“Our most recent survey shows the same or a moderate improvement in travel budgets,” he added. “I’m cautiously optimistic about an uptick in organic growth in 2026.
“We’ve seen a noticeable increase in meetings and events, which gives more of a long-term view given the booking patterns. In the last quarter, there were double-digit increases in forward bookings for meetings and events for 2026. That’s an encouraging sign.”
With the CWT acquisition complete, Amex GBT now projects total 2025 revenue of $2.705 billion to $2.725 billion, up by 12 per cent year-on-year. This is an increase of $227 million in revenue from its previous expectations, stemming fully from the acquisition and with "no change in expectations for the core business," according to the company. For 2026, Amex GBT projects further revenue growth of about 20 per cent year-on-year.
Amex GBT again confirmed that it was targeting $155 million in “synergies” over the next three years following the CWT acquisition. Around $55 million of these savings are forecast to be achieved up to the end of 2026, which will come from cutting jobs, real estate consolidation and vendor savings.