AI and finfluencers bring a new wave of scams
A dangerous combination of artificial intelligence, social media finfluencers, and misplaced consumer trust in unregulated technology is exposing savers to a fresh wave of sophisticated financial scams, retirement specialist Wealth at Work has warned.
The firm is urging the industry and employers to step up financial education after UK Finance’s 2026 Annual Fraud Report revealed criminals stole £1.28bn last year across a record four million confirmed cases.
Simultaneously, law enforcement data shows technology is rapidly accelerating the threat. Figures from the City of London Police reveal reports of AI-enabled fraud surged by 395% in 2025/26, jumping from 193 reports to 956 inside a year.
It really should put some more pressure on the FCA to act as well.
Neat scoop from Citywire New Model Adviser. Timeline is eying a capital event to pay off a £6.3m loan from Octopus.
Jarvis Investment Management Limited has entered special administration, as FTAdviser reports.
Back in September 2022, Jarvis Investment agreed to a voluntary requirement with the FCA, which restricted the activities it could undertake without FCA consent.
Carl Emmerson, partner at London Economics, has authored a new report, arguing that the state pension and workplace savings need to be assessed together when looking at future retirement adequacy. A bit of a spanner in the works for plans to upgrade the state pension less generously with a double lock? Corporate Adviser reports.
Emmerson points out that decisions about the future level and uprating of the state pension will affect how much people need to save privately.
Corporate Adviser also reports on pension minister Torsten Bell reporting that the Commission will issue its final report in February.
Speaking at the Pensions UK event in Liverpool, Bell says: [The final report] will come in February. The government response is not going to sit there for ages. We will deliver that in the spring. So, by the middle of next year, we will have put the state pension on a sustainable basis, and we will have set out the government’s approach to making sure that there is also an adequate private pension system.”
The over 40s could be enrolled into a new social care funding scheme, based on auto-enrolment with opt-outs, under a model being proposed by LCP. Corporate Adviser, which is clearly on top of all the policy news this week, reports.
One to be somewhat concerned about? Moody’s downgrades FNZ and suggests the turnaround will take longer than suggested. Octo Members makes it their big story. The firm sits behind six in ten of the big advised platforms.
An initially shocking tale is winding its way to a seemingly inevitable end. Nexus IFA’s founder Kerry Nelson and business operations manager Jacqueline Stephens plead guilty to a £2 million fraud which took place between 2019 and 2023 with client money being taken.
The FCA having prosecuted the case, issued a press release with all the details, last week. Sentencing is to come.