Reporter’s notebook: Kimi’s AI credit card turns spending into computing quotas – with limits

China’s artificial intelligence companies have spent years persuading consumers to pay for their technology. Now, Moonshot AI, the start-up behind Kimi, is taking a different approach: offering AI computing benefits through a credit card.

The company has teamed up with the Agricultural Bank of China (ABC) and American Express for what it calls “the world’s first AI native credit card”. After getting one for myself, the experience offered an intriguing way to bring AI services into everyday finance, but with limits to the promise.

The card comes in two versions. The premium platinum offers cardholders two months of Kimi’s second most expensive Allegretto membership, now rebranded as Pro, priced at 199 yuan (US$30) per month, after they spend at least 5,888 yuan (US$830) within one month.

The standard version offers eligible new ABC customers three months of the entry-level Andante membership, now known as Go, priced at 49 yuan per month, after making three purchases of at least 18 yuan each.

My initial attempt to obtain the higher-end card was denied at an ABC branch in Beijing, where I was told that my annual income did not meet the requirement. In my case, the requirements focused on traditional banking eligibility rather than anything related to AI use.

I then applied online for the standard card, and eventually received it within a week.

The Kimi co-branded card, launched in July, followed a wave of AI-themed bank cards introduced by Chinese lenders since June. China Merchants Bank’s engineer card, for example, mainly gives new users a one-off token gift pack. But the Kimi card promises to turn everyday spending into access to AI services, including agent usage quotas, coding tools and premium subscriptions.

The Andante membership that came with my card provides additional access to Kimi’s AI agent functions, including document processing, website deployment and coding capabilities.

For a frequent AI user, the rewards are more attractive than shopping vouchers or airport lounge access provided by traditional credit cards.

With the benefits, I tried vibe coding, asking Kimi to refine the visual design and interactive features of a project.

The experience was initially promising. But after roughly six rounds of adjustments, Kimi informed me that my usage quota had been exhausted.

It was a frustrating reminder that access to premium AI services does not necessarily mean having unlimited usage quotas to complete a task.

There are also limits to how long you have access. For example, the memberships that came with the card were just for a few months, not permanent subscriptions.

Neither Moonshot, ABC nor Amex responded to requests for comment.

Moonshot and its partners previously said they would explore additional services, such as agent-based payments, linking tokens to credit quotas, and establishing two-way integration between reward points and computing power.

The push into AI-focused financial services comes as China’s credit card market contracts. The country had 677 million credit cards and debit-credit combo cards at the end of June, down from 807 million in the third quarter of 2022, according to the People’s Bank of China.

Wang Zebin, an investment manager at Shenzhen-based private equity firm JG Investment who focuses on AI investments, said the shift towards computing-based rewards reflected banks’ efforts to attract and retain high-net-worth customers through more targeted offerings.

Whether such products can generate meaningful long-term growth for banks’ credit card business would depend on how lenders integrated AI into their operations, improved credit approvals and risk management, and sustained investment in the AI computing ecosystem, Wang said.