Beating the S&P 500, Polymarket Frauds, AI Economics, World Cup Mania, Best Travel Rewards Credit Card Duo

ByTravelBloggerBuzz Hours Categories TBB

Another TBB post featuring the most eclectic links around the web such as beating the S&P 500, Polymarket frauds, AI economics, World Cup mania, the best travel rewards credit card duo, retirement surprises, supermodel cult, Iran war losses, abuser Andrew Tate, five forbidden islands,  the best photography links and of course always all of the most important developments in the crazy world of frequent flyer miles and points at the lower half of the post. And much more. Enjoy the weekend.

 

Blog Mission: To Educate. Entertain. Inspire. In That Order!

Support TBB by applying for Credit Cards or Buy Me a Coffee or click on Links

No clickbait. No ads. No algorithms. No sponsors. No AI. No paywalls.

 

This blog started way back in 2012 focusing on my crazy hobby addiction of traveling with frequent flyer miles, hotel and bank points. It has since evolved to curated posts featuring the best web content along with my commentary.

 

BLOG HOUSEKEEPING

This is truly a one man labor of love operation, enjoy it while it lasts.

I am trying to make my posts shorter. I think a combination of slower summer content around the web, me trying to be more eclectic in what makes the cut to appear here and heavy World Cup games viewing schedule has definitely contributed to this post be shorter. How do you like it?

 

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

 

“The only thing an old man can tell a young man is that it goes fast, real fast, and if you’re not careful it’s too late. Of course the young man will never understand this truth” – Norm MacDonald

 

MUST READ GEMS 

Best thing I read last  week:

The Adults Don’t Exist

We are all flawed humans…

 

PERSONAL FINANCE

I have been blogging more lately about retirement. It is central to what I do in my real job (blogging is not it by the way) and I am now also personally in the middle of it as I am now contemplating semi retirement and my wife’s last day at work is next week. So I was very interested to learn more about what Ken Dychtwald has to say about his own retirement after he spent his career around this issue: What Surprises Retirement Guru Ken Dychtwald.

…attitudes toward working as you get older have changed. It used to be that if you met someone and they said they were 56 and retired, you’d say, “Wow, congratulations.” Now, people who have had successful careers that don’t involve heavy physical labor often keep working in some way. There are famous examples of that, like Warren Buffett, the Rolling Stones and Martha Stewart, but many other people not in the public eye have decided that fully retiring from work is not for them.

There’s so much about life at this age that’s confusing. And I don’t mean a little bit confusing, I mean utterly confusing. If you gave me $1 million in cash and asked me to explain Medicare, I couldn’t do it—and I’m Mr. Age Wave! There’s Part A, Part B, donut holes, Medicare Advantage, Medicare and Medicaid. For the first seven or eight years, I’d get a Medicare statement that said, “Your Medicare Bill.” Then, on the upper right, it said, “This is not a Bill.” What is it? And it’s not just Medicare. It’s all the documents from insurance companies and financial firms, the complexity of taxes, and the ever-growing threat of elder scams. I’m a somewhat clever guy, I’ve been in the field for 52 years, and I’m fortunate to still have great cognitive health, but it’s all utterly confusing and impossible to understand. 

We created the Peace Corps 70 years ago. Today, I think we need an Elder Corps, where millions of older people can rise up and be the elders in their communities. As boomers, we need to do more and be more; be leaders and contributors versus just being retired. For retirees and society as a whole, our current “retirement” model is wrong. [Amen!]

Also, the link above leads you to a page that is so full of ads that your eyes may hurt, you have been warned. I do not have any ads in my blog by the way.

I often hear people saying that you do not need a financial planner, you just buy the S&P 500 index instead. I am not going to get into how wrong this is but, let me stick with the all mighty S&P 500 index a bit. You know, you should diversify at all times because what works for a while at some point will cease to work. And this is happening lately: Everything is Beating the S&P 500 This Year.

 

TECH/SCAMS/CRYPTO

Some scammers are really way out there. They fool many people. And that “charisma” they have develops into a cult. Thank God this dude died early, he could have done so much more damage. Amazing story, I smell a Netflix special soon to follow HBO: The Untold Saga Behind an Infamous Male Supermodel Cult. Once the world’s highest-paid male model, Hoyt Richards gave his last penny to a socialite conman who claimed to be an alien and preyed on the sexy and susceptible. A new HBO doc tells only half the story.

Everything is so edited online is absolutely ridiculous. And lots of it is just designed to separate you from your money appealing to your greed. Assume everything is fake! They Looked Like They Were Getting Rich on Polymarket—but None of It Was Real. The prediction market has flooded social media with deceptive videos by paid creators, according to a Wall Street Journal investigation. This has to be illegal, lock them up. But, in 2026, on the contrary…

 

AI

Interesting quote by the dude at Anthropic who created Claude:

I don’t prompt Claude anymore. I have loops running that prompt Claude and figuring out what to do. My job is to write loops.

Latest LLM rankings are HERE. For the record, six out of ten are from China.

Some of these are very funny, definitely not all: AI Economics for Dummies.

Acquiring one grape costs Alex $2 billion. Alex offers to sell Mike one grape a month for the next 12 months for $1 billion per grape. Alex asks for the full $12 billion up front and provides Mike with one grape for the first month. Alex makes a $10 billion profit this month; his ARR is $120 billion, and his profits are trending up at an infinite rate. The Wall Street Journal’s business editor moves into Alex’s house, having accepted a part-time position as Alex’s human footstool. He never asks to see the books.

 

 

IRAN WAR

I think this pretty much nails it: The Iran War Is Ending. Everybody Lost.

Trump lost the country. The U.S. lost a half-hearted war. Israel lost an ally. The Middle East lost the illusion of security. Asia lost growth. Global trade lost a dependable artery.

 

ODDZ & ENDZ

I avoided clicking on anything that has to do with this guy. Because who needs to add to the clicks of these horrible people. Anyway, this was in the queue and kind of avoided it. But at some point the queue got shorter and I had time to click and read it. And learned a lot about this guy: Andrew Tate’s Empire of Abuse. How the defining figure of the manosphere built a fortune—and became a political force—by systematically exploiting women. Yikes, I wish I had never clicked on it. If you like this guy WTF is wrong with you, please leave!

If you happened to read the article above, maybe you need to split some firewood. I sure enjoyed doing this, go at it hard lol.

Brutalist architecture by Jean Renaudie around Paris.

 

TRAVEL

I predict an explosion in tourism at Cape Verde after what its football team has accomplished in its first World Cup. Has anyone been there?

Meet up at North Sentinel island anyone? Of course I am joking. Actually skip all these five islands: 5 Isolated Islands That Are Strictly Forbidden (And Why).

We are definitely not #1: The World’s Most and Least Liked Countries. Actually, even Iran, Afghanistan and even North Korea beat us, WTF!

Graphic ranking countries based on their global perceptions.

 

2026 WORLD CUP

I was really worried about this World Cup with its expanded format (48 teams, up from 32 with 104 games in total). But it has been an absolute blast so far and hope it continues, it is like watching 104 Super Bowls: The 48-Team World Cup Was Supposed to Be a Catastrophe. Instead It’s a Classic. Fears about a diluted field and uncompetitive games have been replaced by a goalfest of a group stage, with all the major stars lighting it up.

Amazing tables: Three in Four World Cup World Cup Stars Play Abroad. Not a surprise by the way. But to see that 100% of national team players of these countries have no players in own domestic leagues is still kind of shocking, although the shock has been steadily diminishing for the last 30 to 40 years. Which countries are these that have every single player play abroad? Cape Verde, Curacao, DR Congo, Ivory Coast, Senegal, Uruguay. And the fewest? Qatar and Saudi Arabia at just 3.8%, basically no more than one or two players. Fascinating.

In every international soccer competition we here in the US have to suffer through some of the worst TV commentators. It gets so bad that we sometimes switch to Spanish speaking channels as we don’t understand what they are saying (and just love the universal Goooooooooooool!). And in this World Cup we have to endure Alexi Lalas who is now joined by that incredible specimen Zatlan who thinks he is a gift to humanity. And then enter the Frenchman Henry who has actually won some trophies trying to salvage the ship. Which leads to this hilarious post by the British publication The Guardian. I laughed so hard, thank you to the author: The French aristocrat and the all-American idiot: Henry v Lalas is the World Cup’s most compelling battle.

Lalas’s ubiquitousness every World Cup is American TV’s answer to the Iran war: no one wants it, everyone hates it, and as it drags on, it inevitably becomes a face-saving exercise in damage limitation.

In a conversation where his co-panelist is casually reminiscing about his days playing alongside Messi or exchanging shirts with Ronaldo Nazário at the World Cup, what exactly is Lalas going to talk about – coming on as a second-half substitute for Earnie Stewart in a friendly against Scotland in 1998? Helping the Kansas City Wizards finish last in the 1999 MLS Western Conference? Did Lalas enjoy an elite playing career? No. But does he do the background reading that could compensate for his relative lack of standing in a conversation with titans like Henry and Zlatan? Also no. But is he charming or funny or charismatic or otherwise magnetic on screen? Eh, no. [Lol…I am literally trying to hold myself together from uncontrollable laughing, such a brilliant paragraph, wow!]

Wait, there is more…

For Fox to turn a man as partisan, bullying and unlikeable as Lalas into American soccer’s figurehead is the media equivalent of getting John Wayne Gacy to perform at a children’s birthday party.

 

 

Follow me on Instagram and Subscribe to my YouTube channel

 

 

This blog started with a focus on miles and points and travel. It has evolved since then. Everything below deals with the hobby of collecting frequent flyer miles and points and maximizing your travel experiences. If you are not interested, you can stop here, thank you.

 

 

MILES & POINTS

So, here we go again…

Register for the latest World of Hyatt promo: Earn 2K Bonus Points for Every Two Stays (Max 8K Bonus). The quality of the hotel promotions continues to descend sadly. Now these promos valid after the second stay just suck, boo!

This was coming and now we have dates: Star Alliance Confirms Asiana’s Exit On December 16, 2026 (Miles Earning Ends On October 15).

We had news last week with Wyndham totally revamping its credit cards and even adding a new premium card. And then boom, here is another major change: Wyndham Rewards Introduces New 45,000 Points Award Category & Shuffles Hotels Within Categories In September 15, 2026. What used to be 30,000 it is now likely going to be 45,000.  And so it goes in this space, sad.

I hope World of Hyatt does not ruin this ongoing promo. I find it surprising that no other hotel chain has something similar. Anyway, I have earned two free nights with it so far with 12 brands total (you earn one free night every 5 brands you stay in): The hotel free night promotion you have literally YEARS to complete …. Hyatt Brand Explorer. No need to register or do anything extra, just keep staying in different Hyatt brands and it is tracked automatically.

It is hard to imagine that the long ago destroyed Expedia Rewards program managed to get even worse. No linking, just for the love of God, why are you booking on Expedia in 2026?

 

TRAVEL REWARDS CREDIT CARDS

For ANY questions on travel rewards credit cards, contact me anytime at travelbloggerbuzz@gmail.com

Chase is now crawling back the new $100 hotel credit in its refreshed Sapphire Preferred cards if you book and cancel. This bank is just phucking with us at this point 🙁

Then again, I am often asked what travel rewards credit cards I would recommend, especially from someone starting out. I think the best combo (for simplicity and power) is actually the Chase Sapphire Preferred card along with a Capital One Venture X card. Why? Well, setting aside the incredibly powerful current 100k signup bonus for the CSP card, you get great 3x earnings on dining/gas/EV/Airbns/streaming/online groceries, 2x on other travel and 5x on Lyft and travel booked on the Chase travel portal. More importantly, booking a hotel stay in the Chase travel portal earns a $100 credit which offsets the $95 annual fee. You get AppleTV free for the first year. You can take it with you abroad because it has no foreign transaction fees. You rent a car with it because it offers primary car rental insurance. Every four years you can pay for your Global Entry/TSAPrecheck and get the $120 fee refunded. You can transfer the points earned to airline and hotel partners. Which means if you get additional Chase Ultimate Rewards point earning cards, you can transfer those points to the CSP card (which can then be transferred out to airline/hotel partners). The card offers some great travel protections as well so book your airfare with it.

For non bonus transactions, you use your Capital One Venture X card because it earns 2x on EVERYTHING. Current signup bonus is at 75,000 points and yes they can be transferred out to airline/hotel partners as well. The annual fee is $395 BUT you get a $300 travel statement credit AND 10,000 points at each card anniversary. So, the card pays for itself. Wait, there is more. You get access (no guests) to Capital One lounges AND a Priority Pass Select lounge membership which allows you entry with two guests at well over 1,000 airline lounges around the world.

I think this is the most powerful and simple credit card duo today. Change my mind. Yes I conveniently added this here hoping to increase this blog’s credit card sales, so thanks in advance for supporting this blog. For the record, all four of us in my household do have and keep both of these cards so there. Please ask any questions here or via email.

 

100k CHASE SAPPHIRE PREFERRED REFRESH:

This card has become a no brainer for, well, almost everyone. Especially if you are new into this travel reward cards space and absolutely do not care about Hyatt points whatsoever. Let me explain why you should get this card. Well, most of my readers either have this card or can no longer get it again due to Chase Bank’s new severe restrictions eliminating us credit card miles/points enthusiasts. This IS a great card for someone starting out by the way. We all have it in my household and are definitely keeping it. Because for just $95 dollars annual fee you get:

and of course for just $5,000 minimum spend in three months you get 100,000 Chase Ultimate Rewards points! Even if you did not do much with the points and just cashed them out for a penny per point, it means you pocket $1,000. For an annual fee of $95 plus all the goodies above, DO THE MATH! Of course, you can transfer the points out to travel partners like United or Southwest or Hyatt and get way more than a penny per point. Yes, it is a bit more work but it can make this card even more valuable.

There are many places online you can use to apply for this card. For the love of God, do not use the links from The Points Guy or any other big outfit pretending to be “in the hobby” when they are a big business selling plastic for the banks. Maybe prefer a small independent blogger who is into this for the love of the game and been doing it for decades and would still be here most likely if banks stopped paying bloggers to sell plastic for them #hint. Anyway, email me with ANY questions, thank you for the support.

 

 

LATEST OFFERS:

CHASE Sapphire Reserve for Business: 200,000 Points Sign Up Bonus

CHASE INK Cash & INK Unlimited 100,000 Points Signup Bonus

 

100k CHASE Sapphire Reserve: $795 Annual Fee.  Minimum spend $6,000 in three months

 

A whole bunch of new offers for Delta Skymiles, ENDING JULY 15.

90k AMEX Delta Skymiles Gold: Minimum spend is $5,000 over six months

100k AMEX Delta Skymiles Platinum: Minimum spend is $6,000 over six months

125k AMEX Delta Skymiles Reserve: Minimum spend is $9,000 over six months

90k AMEX Delta Skymiles Gold Business: Minimum spend is $6,000 over six months

100k AMEX Delta Skymiles Platinum Business: Minimum spend is $8,000 over six months

125k AMEX Delta Skymiles Reserve Business: Minimum spend is $15,000 over six months

 

There are three certainties in life: Death, taxes and always revolving new Chase Southwest credit card offers, the latest: Chase Southwest Personal Cards: 80,000-90,000 Points Signup Bonus. ENDING JULY 2.

  • Southwest Priority ($229 fee): Earn 90,000 points after you spend $3,000 on purchases in the first 3 months from account opening.
  • Southwest Premier ($149 fee): Earn 85,000 points after you spend $2,000 on purchases in the first 3 months from account opening.
  • Southwest Plus ($99 fee): Earn 80,000 points after you spend $1,000 on purchases in the first 3 months from account opening.

 

150k AMEX Marriott Bonvoy Business PLUS $125 Statement Credit: $125 Annual fee, minimum spend $8,000 in the first six months. For more info on the card’s benefits click HERE. ENDING JULY 15.

125k CHASE Marriott Bonvoy Boundless + 1 Free Night: Minimum spend is $3,000 over three months.

 

As High As 200,000 Points on the AMEX Business Gold after spending $15k in the first three months

 

100,000 BANK OF AMERICA Atmos Summit after spending $6,500 in the first three months. And a 50% flight discount voucher

80,000 BANK OF AMERICA Atmos Ascent after spending $4,000 in the first four months. And a 50% flight discount voucher

85,000 BANK OF AMERICA Atmos Business after spending $5,500 in the first three months

 

75k CITI AAdvantage Business World Elite MasterCard

 

175k AMEX Platinum & 300k AMEX Business Platinum

75k CITI Strata Elite card

75k CAPITAL ONE Venture X

 

Due to credit card vendor restrictions, the only affiliate links I can place in the body of my posts are for Capital One cards. You can always email me at travelbloggerbuzz@gmail.com with ANY questions.

 

Please help the small independent blogs like mine continue to exist by supporting them with your CREDIT CARD clicks, thank you!

 

 

BONUS OFFERS NOTIFICATIONS

Would you like to be automatically notified every time a card comes out with (or is about to remove) an elevated welcome offer? If yes, I highly encourage you to sign up if you haven’t yet. And when you apply for a credit card from a link in these emails you help support the blog.

Elevated Card Offer Notifications

All you have to do to receive these free notifications is:

1. Click on the link above

2. Create an account

3. Subscribe

 

 

MY ACTION AND BLOG BUZZING

I burned another 40,500 World of Hyatt points for the Hyatt Place Sukhumvit Soi 24 in Bangkok for the next 9 nights in my Asia trip coming up. This followed burning 45,000 World of Hyatt points for 10 nights at the other Hyatt Place in Sukhumvit Soi 1, next to Bumrungrad Hospital where I will be spending some time doing full checkups and stuff like that. I have stayed in both properties on points every year since 2023. At some point, them World of Hyatt points will end, shame on you Chase Bank for doing this to me lol. For the record, these properties are Category 1 (and waaaaaay better than equivalent Category 1 Hyatt Place properties in the US, if you can find them that is). And cost 5,000 points the past three years. So, after the mega World of Hyatt program refresh devaluation massacre of early 2026, they cost 4,500 points. I think it has more to do with staying there in the low tourist season than the program’s generosity by the way.

After the first 19 nights in these two properties, we depart for the Park Hyatt Saigon, four nights in a confirmed suite for 80,000 World of Hyatt points. Then I need to book another 6 nights in Bangkok, I will wait to do this after I do some spreadsheet work comparing what bang I get for every point per dollar compared to a deal offered by one of the two properties to prepay for 30 nights at around $68 per night. I am leaning towards just doing that and canceling my 2 reservations to get my 85,500 World of Hyatt points back. To save them for some aspirational Hyatt properties next year. Before these points get eventually extinct. Hmmm, decisions decisions. I miss the days when I just burned points every single time without doing any mental gymnastics.

After that we have a 2 night stay in Singapore provided by the wedding party whose wedding we attend. And then I burned a $300 credit in wife’s new Schwab Amex Platinum to move to the Conrad Singapore Marina Bay hotel for one night FHR stay. Do you think this is a nice property, should I add my own FHR $300 credit (have to wait until July rolls in) for a second back to back night? Hmm, I also wonder how flexible AMEX Travel is by “editing” wife’s Hilton Honors numbers to mine so I get all the night credits and points (after the $300 credit is posted of course). Any tips on FHR bookings highly welcome here in the comments, thank you.

I swear, I thought that Alan Greenspan was dead for a while. So, when I learned he died last week at the age of 100 I was surprised.

I think I drink too much coffee and have been thinking about drinking less of it. Then when I learned this week that Voltaire drank fifty cups of coffee every day I changed my mind. 🙂

I have now walked over 10,000 steps a day for two months in a row. And I highly recommend it.

I will upload some videos on my YouTube channel next week from some hotels in Asia a devoted fan of the blog recently stayed in. Such as the Andaz in Bali and KROMO, a Hilton Curio Collection property in Bangkok (amazing deal for that Amex Platinum The Hotel Collection credit by the way) which looks absolutely amazing. Please subscribe so I can be more motivated to post more videos, 103 subscribers in 14 years is not very encouraging lol. Full disclosure: I took a break of about 12 years from posting any video woohoo.

Thanks to the five readers who got a travel rewards credit card with my links this month. And the two readers for the coffee sales. I think this is the first time ever that credit card sales outnumber coffee sales.

Last two days of 6 World Cup games a day and the elimination games start on Sunday. When the drama shoots way up, loving every minute of it.

 

Follow TBB on Instagram and Subscribe on YouTube

 

Check out my page listing my affiliate links HERE including Rakuten and Top Cash Backand Rove Miles and more.

 

HOT CREDIT CARD OFFERS:

100k CHASE Sapphire Preferred, 100k CHASE Ink Cash, 100k CHASE Ink Unlimited, 200k CHASE Sapphire Reserve Business, 100k CHASE Sapphire Reserve, 75k CITI Strata Elite, 75k CAPITAL ONE Venture Rewards, 100k CHASE Ink Business Preferred, 175k AMEX Platinum, 75k CAPITAL ONE Venture X, 300k AMEX Business Platinum, 80k – 90k CHASE Personal Southwest Cards (ENDING 7/2/2026), 200k AMEX Business Gold, 200k CAPITAL ONE Spark Cash Plus, 100k BofA Alaska Atmos Summit, 80k BofA Alaska Atmos Ascent, 85k BofA Alaska Atmos Business, 30k CHASE United Gateway, 100k AMEX Gold, 15k AMEX Blue Business Plus and many more!

 

As of today, I have burned 619,015 miles/points year to date (after burning 1,893,248 miles/points in 2025  and 2,027,816 in 2024) and have 4,165,761 miles/points in the bank.

 

TBB’s Miles & Points RESOURCES Page

 

Let me leave you with this:

Wife’s farewell retirement party at Ford

Some of the links are behind a paywall. You can try to read them using Archive.is.

 

Thank you for reading my blog. If you enjoy it please forward it to a family member or friend. Or Buy Me a Coffee, thank you!

Feel free to contact me anytime at travelbloggerbuzz@gmail.com, all feedback is very appreciated.

George

You can receive each blog post by entering your email address below and then clicking on SUBSCRIBE below, no spam ever!:

You can also support the blog to help cover the costs of running it and keeping it free by donating via Paypal:

This site may receive compensation for sending traffic to partner sites. Travel Blogger Buzz and Your Best Credit Cards may receive a commission from card issuers. This compensation may impact how and where links appear on this site. This site does not necessarily include all financial companies or all available financial offers. The editorial content on this page is not provided by any of the companies mentioned, and have not been reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by any of these entities. Opinions expressed here are the author’s alone.

Similar Posts

5 Comments

  1. Finished the post barely at 7.57 am. Mailchimp sends it to email list subscribers at 8 am. Sadly, I had no time to carefully edit it so the emails went out with some typos. Which have now been fixed. You can request a refund, I do my best to keep this going.

    One Carlos dude decided getting one email per week is too much and unsubscribed. It is probably the dude who has been complaining my blog is ultra leftie. Whatever, good riddance. It is a free country…well, less free definitely.

    Enjoy the weekend and the World Cup games!

    Reply
  2. Pingback: Beating the S&P 500, Polymarket Frauds, AI Economics, World Cup Mania, Best Travel Rewards Credit Card Duo – Travel Blogs

  3. Hi George! I went to Cabo Verde last year for my wedding anniversary. It’s super easy to do cheaply- EasyJet and Vueling (low cost carriers here in the EU) both fly to Sal Island, which is fairly inexpensive. Highly recommend- i wish we’d had time to go to nearby Senegal too.

    Reply

  4. I hope you are enjoying the World Cup here and get to some games. I’ve been hooked on
    the YouTube posts by folks who point to the disconnect between what they expected
    and what they observed.

    Glasgow last week was much fun! I hope to get back.

    Thanks for the links!

    Reply

  5. Finally caught up on email this morning and skimmed through as it is always a lot so will entertain me for the next few days. I traded in all my UR (thanks for the advice BTW0 to Hyatt and some to Marriott as I am planning a road trip through smaller places across the country. That stash ought to take care of me pretty much all the way and also have some IHG points to use too!

    Had the heart procedure Wednesday and the doc says he think 90+% chance I won’t have to do it again. Recovery the first 48 hours is OK but I’ll be glad to get the stitches out.

    Also working on a plan for Italy (yeah, again). It seems harder to do though and I wonder if this is my last big trip there. 70 approaches soon.

    I like your planning for a nice long trip to Thailand and also Vietnam. Been there once (Vietnam) and loved it.

    Thanks for putting this all together!

    Reply

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *