American Express

Amex's structural position is different from Visa and Mastercard: it is both the network and the issuer, it charges the highest merchant fees in the market, and it has historically enforced anti-steering rules preventing merchants from encouraging customers toward cheaper payment methods - a practice the Supreme Court declined to condemn in the 2018 Ohio v. American Express decision, which held that the plaintiffs had failed to show net harm across the two-sided platform. That ruling is why the merchant fight moved to Visa and Mastercard and to legislation instead. The consumer-facing translation: the reason you rarely see a cash discount at the counter is a contract you are not party to.

• Severity
• Evidence tierUnassigned
• Claims confirmed
• Last verified2026-08-04

Case status. Private litigation; no sources are on file yet, so no legal tier is assigned.

Primary source. None recorded — Unverified - heuristic first draft.

Arbitration

$17.5 MILLION SETTLEMENT (2026) over 'ANTI-STEERING' merchant rules: American Express's merchant agreements allegedly prevented retailers (including Walmart, Target, Home Depot, CVS, Walgreens, Kroger, and Best Buy) from encouraging customers to pay with LOWER-FEE cards (i.e., a basic Visa/Mastercard/Discover instead of Amex) — plaintiffs argued this kept prices artificially high for ALL customers, including non-Amex cardholders, since merchants had to price in Amex's higher fees uniformly rather than passing savings through when a cheaper card was used. Notably, A JURY FOUND DAMAGES ONLY FOR THE ILLINOIS NON-REWARDS CREDIT CARD CLASS (a reported $12.5M verdict, E.D.N.Y.) — the jury found Amex violated Illinois law but NOT the laws of the other states with certified (state-law) classes, and found no damage to the Illinois debit class, illustrating how the same underlying conduct can be found unlawful in one state's law but not another's, or under federal law generally.

Contacts

Privacy contact. Not recorded.

Legal notice. PUBLIC COMPANY (AXP). Service route: c/o General Counsel / Corporate Secretary, New York, New York — the corporate address on the SEC Form 10-K cover page is the official address of record. Confirm the exact street address on the current 10-K at sec.gov/edgar, and check the state-of-incorporation registered agent (usually Delaware; most large filers use The Corporation Trust Company or Corporation Service Company) via the Secretary of State business-entity search. A registered agent MUST accept service, which is why it is the reliable channel when a company publishes no privacy address.

Mailing address. Not recorded.