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⚠️The Brad Pitt Scam 🎁 £50 exclusive bonus + 💼 Work-life Integration vs Balance

The 99 - 2nd December 2024

January 20, 2025

Good afternoon and welcome to The 99: the home of financial news and insights made simple. You can count on accessible, trustworthy, and unbiased news insights every Monday.

This week, you’ll find your usual round-up of must-know financial stories, plus:

As always, if you have any feedback, questions or content requests, just reply to this email. We would love to hear from you.

Alice & the GFY team x

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The Latest on UK Growth and Inflation

What the figures mean for you

🤔 What is happening to Inflation*?

  • UK Inflation was 2.5% in Dec 2024, down from 2.6% in Nov and 2.3% in Oct 2024. 

  • This means prices increased slower than they did in November 2024, due to easing restaurant and hotel costs in December 2024.

  • However, this makes it the third consecutive month above the BoE’s 2% target.

2024 Recap: Inflation hit the BoE’s 2% target rate in May and June, then rose slightly to 2.2% in July and August, and hit an all year low of 1.7% in Sep 2024. 

*Inflation is the general increase in the prices of goods and services in an economy over time.

🔍What is happening to GDP*?

  • The UK economy grew by 0.1% in November 2024. 

  • According to the ONS, the growth in the services sector was the main contributor to the growth in GDP. 

*GDP stands for Gross Domestic Product and is a measure of all the economic activities of people, companies, and the government. It is published quarterly by the Office of National Statistics (ONS).

✍️ What does this mean for you?

  • Higher cost of living remains as the prices of goods and services are not coming down as fast as expected and remain above the BoE’s target 2%.

  • The growth in the economy means more public spending and makes it more likely for the government to deliver on its projects and promise of improved living standards in the Prime Minister’s Plan for Change.

Recap: In Dec 2024, The Prime Minister, Keir Starmer, announced his 6 Milestones for a Mission-Led Government called  “The Plan for Change”. 

The first promise is to raise living standards in every part of the UK, so working people have more money in their pocket, and aim to deliver the highest sustained growth in the G7.

The Chancellor, Rachel Reeves, responded that she was “determined to go further and faster to kickstart economic growth, and this means generating investment, driving reform and a relentless commitment to root out waste in public spending”.

According to CNBC

👀Looking Ahead…

  • The BoE uses interest rates as a tool to steady inflation and due to the recent drop in inflation, economists now predict more rate cuts in 2025.

  • The BoE will hold its first MPC meeting on Feb 6 to decide whether to cut the base rate.

  • It is also predicted that inflation may remain slightly high, due to the proposed rise in national wage, household bills and Employer National Insurance due in April 2025.

How a fake “Brat Pitt” scam cost a woman £700k

AI Assisted Fraud Explained

A woman in France has lost £700,000 in a scam which led her to believe she was in an online relationship with the actor Brad Pitt.

Over 18 months, the woman fell in love with the AI-assisted scammer, even receiving a marriage proposal.

🤔 How did it start?

She was first asked for money to pay for customs charges on handbags the fake ‘Brad’ had promised to send her.

Later she was asked to pay for cancer treatment - a request which was accompanied by fake photos of Brad Pitt in a hospital bed.

📢 What did the real Brad Pitt Say:

After the story made the news, the real Brad Pitt made a statement saying that: “It’s awful that scammers take advantage of the strong bond between fans and celebrities.”

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He also warned people to stay vigilant of unexpected online message requests, especially from actors who are not present on social networks.

Meanwhile the police in France continues to investigate the situation.

💞 What is a dating and romance scam?

The ‘Brad Pitt’ story is an example of a scam built on a fictitious relationship.

These dating and romance scams typically involve a person connecting with someone online and becoming increasingly trusting of them.

They may try to find out increasingly personal information about you without giving a lot of information about themselves.

👀What you should look out for?

❗️Scammers often build a 'relationship' through personal chats before asking for money, citing reasons like illness or hardship.

🤚 The Met Police advise people to not send money or accept money in these circumstances.

🤐 The MET also says to not keep the online relationship secret… often friends and family outside the relationship will be the first to spot the signs of a scam).

⚠️ What other AI-assisted scams are out there?

At the end of last year, MoneyWeek published a guide to 5 common AI scams, which include:

Deepfakes - often uses audio and video to impersonate people.

ChatGPT phishing - copies a person or company’s writing style to produce fake messages.

Voice cloning - copies a person’s voice.

Verification fraud - using fake photos and videos as evidence to pass security checks.

AI-generated websites - producing fake websites which look very similar to the real website.

⚠️ You can read up on tips for spotting these types of scams here.

BrewDog Founder Slams UK Work Ethic

Work-life integration vs balance

BrewDog boss James Watt has started an online row after posting a video with his fiancée Georgia Toffolo saying that ‘work-life balance is for people who hate the work that they do' and that the UK is ‘one of the world’s least work-oriented countries’.

The video, originally shared on LinkedIn, features Watt and his fiancée Georgia Toffolo advocating for 'work-life integration' - the idea of blending your job and your personal life.

In it, Watt says: 'I just think the whole concept of work-life balance was invented by people who hate the work that they do. So if you love what you do, you don't need work-life balance, you need work-life integration.'

Toff, best known for her time on Made in Chelsea and as the winner of I’m a Celebrity in 2017, backed her fionce’s stance, saying the couple are “scarily similar” in their approach to work.

👀What’s the reaction?

Social media response is in two camps – shocker! On LinkedIn the video gained a lot of traction and a generally favourable response...

...But the pair also faced backlash, with critics accusing them of lacking self-awareness.

The Trades Union Congress (TUC) hit back with a video highlighting James Watt’s controversial past. The video points out that “we are all entitled to a work-life balance” and warns not to “let a pretend hipster boss tell you otherwise.”

👎 Why the backlash?

It’s not the first time the BrewDog founder has sparked controversy.

The brand has always described itself as a disruptor, challenging the status quo of the alcohol industry, but it’s often found itself at the centre of accusations of hypocrisy.

The issue with Watt’s comments is that they sound pretty out of touch in a time where a lot of people are struggling to make ends meet.

And his own actions as CEO of BrewDog haven’t helped his image... In 2021, 61 current and former employees signed a letter accusing him of presiding over a ‘toxic culture of fear’.

Watt is also personally worth £262 million, but the business announced last year they would no longer pay their workers the real living wage due to making a trading loss in 2023.

Julie Burchill sums it up beautifully in The Spectator: ‘most people aren’t pilots or writers or make millions founding a beer brand. It’s absolutely logical that people who work at a thing which brings them no pleasure in order to pay their bills want to do the least of that thing as they can get away with.’

Sources/Read More:

Inflation down to 2.5% in Dec 2024 and GDP up by 0.1% in November 2024

How did a fake “Brat Pitt” scam cost a woman £700k

What’s Brewing?