Card News

Card News

Return the last-3-month news view of one exact card variant in compact format.

When To Use

When the user asks about recent changes, news, or updates for a credit card. Trigger phrases: "card-news", "any changes", "recent news", "what's new with", "updates for".

Workflow

1. Resolve card identity — normalize and match to one exact variant. If ambiguous, return a numbered choice list and stop.
2. Search — use WebSearch by default with a recent-results bias. If BRAVE_API_KEY is available and curl exists, you may use one Brave Search API call with freshness filter instead.
3. Fetch pages — fetch the top news pages before deciding whether another search is needed.
4. Filter — apply 3-month lookback window and inclusion rules.
5. Pace any follow-up searches — if another search is needed, wait briefly instead of bursting requests.
6. Compile — assemble the news report.
7. Confidence — flag uncertain or conflicting claims.

Step 1: Card Identity Resolution

Common Abbreviations

Only shorthands and ambiguous names need entries here. Cards with full, unambiguous names (e.g., "Chase Marriott Bonvoy Boundless", "Chase United Explorer", "American Express Hilton Honors Aspire") are resolved via search — no table entry needed.

Supported Issuers

American Express, Bank of America, Barclays, Bilt, Capital One, Chase, Citi, Discover, Robinhood, U.S. Bank, Wells Fargo.

Step 2: Search

Use the platform's WebSearch and WebFetch tools by default. If BRAVE_API_KEY is available and the runtime also provides curl, you may use Brave Search API instead for faster and more repeatable search results.

Optional Brave template:

curl -sS "https://api.search.brave.com/res/v1/web/search?q=CARD+NAME+news+CURRENT_YEAR&count=20&freshness=p3m" \
  -H "X-Subscription-Token: $BRAVE_API_KEY"

The freshness=p3m parameter limits results to the past 3 months, matching the lookback window. Replace CURRENT_YEAR with the actual current year.

Search Budget Rule

Treat search as scarce and paced. Built-in web search is the default path; if Brave mode is used, it may rate-limit after only a few closely spaced requests.

• Start with one search.
• Fetch the top result pages before deciding whether another search is needed.
• If an extra search is needed, wait about 2 to 5 seconds first.
• If Brave returns 429, wait about 8 to 15 seconds and retry once.
• If Brave is unavailable, continue with WebSearch + WebFetch.
• If it still fails, continue with the best evidence already gathered and note the limitation in ## 📋 Confidence Notes.

Source Policy

• Issuer newsrooms first: check issuer blogs and press release pages.
• Max 5 secondary sources from: Doctor of Credit (preferred), The Points Guy (preferred), One Mile at a Time (preferred), NerdWallet (preferred), Bankrate (preferred), Upgraded Points.
• Disallowed: Reddit, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, X, YouTube, referral links, user forums.

Recency Rules

• Use a 3-month lookback window only.
• Include: direct card changes, issuer updates that materially affect the card, major approved-site coverage that changes how the card should be understood.
• Exclude: generic issuer chatter, evergreen "best card" articles that do not describe a recent change.

Step 4: Fetch Pages

Pick up to 2 top article URLs (prefer doctorofcredit.com and thepointsguy.com) from the search results. Fetch in parallel with WebFetch.

Approved news pages are limited to issuer newsroom pages and the approved news/article domains named in this skill. Do not fetch or cite article pages from any other domain.

URL Safety Rules

• Prefer WebFetch for page retrieval. Use curl only for the optional Brave Search API calls above, not for arbitrary result URLs.
• Never execute a shell command that interpolates a raw URL taken directly from search results.
• Only fetch URLs when all of the following are true:
  1. scheme is https
  2. hostname matches a supported issuer domain or an approved article domain from this skill
  3. the URL is being passed to WebFetch, not inserted into a shell pipeline
• If a result URL fails those checks, skip it and use the next valid result.

News snippets often lack dates and detail — the full article has the complete story and timeline.

Required Output Sections

## 📅 News Window

Start and end dates of the 3-month lookback window.

## 📰 Recent Updates

Numbered list of material changes with date and short summary per item.

## 📝 Summary

2-3 sentence synthesis of what changed and what stayed the same.

## 📋 Confidence Notes

Flag any uncertain, unconfirmed, or conflicting claims.

## 🔗 Sources

Numbered list of URLs fetched, as markdown hyperlinks with short "Site - Topic" labels.

Output Rules

• Use one emoji per section heading and numbered lists
• When listing credits, fees, or any monetary amounts, sort from highest to lowest dollar value. for updates.
• Keep content to condensed facts — no prose padding.
• Omit the Card Identity section when the match is confident.
• Do not show YAML blocks in output.
• End every report with a ## 🔗 Sources section listing each URL fetched during research as a markdown hyperlink with a short "Site - Topic" label, e.g. [Doctor of Credit - Amex Gold Changes](https://...).

Confidence Definitions

• confirmed: supported by issuer terms or multiple approved sources
• unconfirmed: plausible but not fully resolved
• conflicting: sources disagree on a material fact