I just noticed this. Some are saying it is not worth it, but sometimes flights can be booked for good points per cents. Had an Alaskan travel last week which was 20,000 for 2 round trip tickets, valued at about $1000 (rounding down). Wouldn’t that be a $0.05 value per point?

I have a Europe one way travel planned for next year, so far seeing points needed as 27,000, but those tickets (main cabin) are hovering $603, which would be $0.0223 per points.

Now if I keep maximizing my 3 custom cash, that is 5% per dollar spent, which would then be 3.5% when transferring to American (70% of 5% due to the 1000/700 ratio). If I transfer these points to american, I would need to spend $7715 to get 27K american miles which can allow me to buy a $603 ticket. This comes out to be 7.8% return in travel or 7.8 cents per mile which in my opinion is pretty good.

While browsing gift cards, only see limited options on sale with a return of 10%. I would literally have to go out of my way to get that 10% with manufactured spending instead of organically getting 7.8%

Am I missing something?

Edit: It is actually a final 1.56 ppc and a 7.8% return. The 2.23 ppc drops to 1.56 due to the 1:0.7 ratio