For bucks’ sake: the rise of self-made billionaires

Summary

The Economist Podcasts: The Intelligence
Episode: For bucks’ sake: the rise of self-made billionaires
Date: July 23, 2026

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Episode Overview

This episode of The Intelligence explores the evolving landscape of global billionaires, examining the increasing prevalence of "self-made" fortunes and considering whether today’s billionaires are more legitimate or less prone to the abuses and excesses of the past. Host Rosie Blore speaks with senior economics writer Callum Williams about new research into the origins of billionaire wealth, the forces behind its reallocation, and what this means for debates over wealth taxation and inequality.

The episode also features reports on Cambodia’s ongoing struggle with criminal “scam compounds” and concludes with a lighthearted segment on Larry the Cat, Chief Mouser at 10 Downing Street, and what he might teach Britain’s newest prime minister.

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Main Segment: The Rise of Self-Made Billionaires

1. The Current Backlash Against Billionaires (01:12 – 02:37)

• Host Rosie Blore and Callum Williams set the stage, describing the surge in anti-billionaire sentiment.
• Public discourse questions whether billionaires have a right to exist, and many politicians frame extreme wealth as a policy failure.
• Notable Quote:
  • Rosie Blore (02:03): "Do you think that billionaires have a right to exist?"
  • Callum Williams (02:07): "I don't think that we should have billionaires because frankly, it is so much money."

2. The Legitimacy of Billionaire Wealth (02:38 – 03:40)

• Despite anti-billionaire sentiment, research suggests that more billionaires are now self-made, their fortunes derived from providing useful goods, services, or employment rather than by exploiting the system or inheriting wealth.
• Callum Williams (02:48): "There's a growing number of billionaires that are deriving their wealth mainly by providing genuinely useful goods and services... rather than by taking advantage of the system."
• The study divides billionaire wealth into "uncompetitive" (derived from politics, inheritance, extractive industries) and "competitive" (from goods, services, and value creation).

3. Shifting Sectors: Where Are Billionaires Making Their Money? (04:28 – 05:46)

• The new billionaire class is emerging from multiple sectors, not just tech.
• Examples include entertainment (Taylor Swift, Lionel Messi), retail (founder of Uniqlo), fast casual dining (Panda Express), and finance.
• Callum Williams (04:38): "What I found quite surprising is that actually the tech share of billionaire wealth is not at an all time high... it's lots and lots like this, rather than it all being tech or all being oligarchs."

4. Globalization and Market Forces Driving Billionaire Wealth (05:47 – 07:11)

• China’s rapid growth and the explosion of consumer markets have massively increased the number of self-made billionaires.
• Robust stock market returns, especially in the US, have driven much of the increase.
• The mobile-first internet era, beginning in the mid-2010s, allowed companies to scale globally at unprecedented rates (e.g., ByteDance, Spotify, Stripe).
• Callum Williams (06:55): "What phones basically allowed people and businesses to do was to scale an idea incredibly fast."

5. Is the System Still Being Gamed? Taxes, Policy and Inequality (07:12 – 09:13)

• Host challenges the clean distinction, suggesting billionaires can still game the system, e.g., via aggressive tax strategy.
• Williams agrees that while egregious, illegitimate oligarch-type fortunes are less dominant, questions about fairness and inequality persist.
• US billionaires are estimated to pay effective tax rates of 45–50% annually; the evidence doesn’t clearly show that tax manipulation is the main cause of billionaire proliferation.

6. The Case for Wealth Taxes Revisited (09:14 – 10:24)

• Williams offers a nuanced view:
  • If the core concern is extreme influence, the source of wealth is irrelevant.
  • But if legitimacy and economic cost are considered, taxing legitimate entrepreneurs might harm innovation, services, or even culture (citing Messi and Panda Express as examples of tangible social value).
• Callum Williams (09:31): "It feels much more legitimate to tax someone very heavily if they've accumulated their wealth illegitimately than it does if they've made their money in a good way."

7. Concluding Thoughts on Billionaire Legitimacy (10:24 – 10:26)

• Conversation highlights the complexity and evolving nature of the billionaire question: legitimacy, impact, and fairness are increasingly complicated by the sources and dynamics of wealth.
• The host mentions an upcoming insider interview with Elon Musk for further billionaire insights.

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Segment 2: Crackdown on Cambodia’s Scam Compounds (12:16 – 19:59)

1. What Are Scam Compounds? (12:16 – 14:28)

• Su Lin Wong, Asia correspondent, outlines the industrial scale of global online scamming, run by organized criminal gangs largely from China and operating in Southeast Asia.
• The scam industry makes over $500 billion a year—comparable to the global illicit drug trade.
• Su Lin Wong (13:31): "When you receive a message on WhatsApp... that's a message being sent by an incredibly sophisticated industry that we labelled Scam Inc."

2. Why Cambodia Became the Scamming Hub (14:28 – 15:58)

• Cambodia’s scam industry generates up to $19 billion annually (40% of formal GDP).
• Many scams originated in China, moving abroad after internal crackdowns.
• Scams are often run from inside casinos, which assist in money laundering.
• Recent government crackdowns led to the closure of over 90 casinos and the release of thousands of trafficked workers into humanitarian crisis.

3. The Case of Chenzhi and International Sanctions (15:58 – 17:58)

• Notorious crime boss Chenzhi, advisor to Cambodia’s former strongman Hun Sen, was extradited to China, unnerving other criminal leaders and sparking a mass exodus from scam compounds.
• US and UK, among other countries, have imposed sanctions and seized billions in cryptocurrency related to these networks.

4. Impact on Cambodian Tourism and Resilience of Scam Industry (18:08 – 18:52)

• Chinese tourists to Cambodia have plummeted (from 2.4 million in 2019 to 850,000 in 2024) due to fear of trafficking.
• Cambodia is now offering visa-free entry to Chinese visitors to boost tourism recovery.

5. Why Crackdowns Aren’t Working (18:45 – 19:57)

• Amnesty International counted 86 scam compounds in Cambodia in 2026 (up from 53 the year before), showing the industry adapts rather than dies out.
• Historical cycles show that once international attention wanes, illegal industries resurge.
• Su Lin Wong (18:52): "I fear that we're going to see a similar pattern with scams... unless and until we see [high-level] ministers... sanctioned, detained, arrested... Cambodia will continue to be a hub for online scams."

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Segment 3: Larry the Cat & Lessons for Political Survival (20:22 – 26:18)

1. Journalistic Hijinks Outside Number 10 Downing Street (20:22 – 21:41)

• Chris Impey, “cat correspondent,” tries unsuccessfully to lure Larry the Cat for a photo-op, highlighting the feline’s elusiveness.

2. Larry’s Political Career and Influence (21:41 – 22:39)

• Larry has served as Chief Mouser to the Cabinet Office for 15 years, outlasting seven prime ministers and witnessing major moments like Brexit.

3. Life Lessons from Larry (23:15 – 26:18)

• Key takeaways for politicians, drawn from Larry’s legendary survival skills:
  • Have a compelling backstory (Larry is an animal shelter rescue).
  • Either be effective at your role—or ensure everyone believes you are.
  • Command media attention and wield soft power (Larry’s viral moments and public gifts).
  • Ruthlessly fend off rivals and maintain your turf.
• Narrator (25:45): "Such canny political manoeuvring has blessed Larry with public approval ratings that most politicians would sell their cat for."

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Select Notable Quotes With Timestamps

• Callum Williams (02:48): "But what we have found is that there's a growing number of billionaires that are deriving their wealth mainly by providing genuinely useful goods and services or employing millions of people rather than by taking advantage of the system."
• Su Lin Wong (13:31): "[Online fraud] is now estimated to make more than US$500 billion a year globally... this industry is now roughly the same size as the global illicit drug trade."
• Callum Williams (09:31): "It feels much more legitimate to tax someone very heavily if they've accumulated their wealth illegitimately than it does if they've made their money in a good way."
• Chris Impey (26:18): "Stood up by the Downing Street cat. We did get to see lots of guns. We didn't see a cat... The most popular member of the Cabinet Office refused to talk to the Economist."

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Key Timestamps

• 01:12 – Billionaire backlash intro
• 02:48 – Shift from oligarchs to competitive, self-made billionaires
• 04:28 – Billionaires from various sectors, not just tech
• 05:47 – Globalization, China, and mobile-first scaling
• 07:12 – Systemic gaming, taxes, and inequality
• 09:31 – Wealth taxation debate re-examined
• 12:16 – Cambodia scam compounds explainer
• 15:58 – Extradition of crime boss Chenzhi
• 18:08 – Tourism fallout in Cambodia
• 18:52 – Why scam industry persists despite crackdowns
• 20:22 – Larry the Cat and political lessons

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Tone & Style

The episode is concise, analytical, and blends serious economic analysis with offbeat storytelling, maintaining The Economist’s signature journalistic rigor and wit. Notably, speaker tone ranges from expert (Williams, Wong) to wry and playful (Impey’s cat hunt), inviting listeners to both engage critically and enjoy lighter moments.

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This summary provides a rich overview, key insights, memorable moments, and relevant timestamps for listeners who want to grasp the full depth and character of this episode of The Intelligence.

Transcript

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[Callum Williams]

The economist.

[Rosie Blore]

Hello and welcome to the Intelligence from the Economist. I'm Rosie Blore. Today on the show, a new crackdown on scam compounds in Cambodia and lessons for Britain's Prime Minister from Larry the Cat. First up, though. Billionaires have never exactly been popular, today they're positively loathed.

[Callum Williams]

The American people are standing in opposition to oligarchy.

[Rosie Blore]

Do you think that billionaires have a right to exist?

[Callum Williams]

I don't think that we should have billionaires because frankly, it is so much money.

[Sponsor Voice]

In a moment of such inequality, we

[Su Lin Wong]

need a tax system that truly accounts

[Journalist/Reporter]

for the fact that there are people who have amassed huge wealth, and not

[Rosie Blore]

just by us ordinary folk, but many politicians too. Some talk about their mere existence as a policy failure. But just as the political class thinks it's hit on a winning message, something unexpected is happening. Billionaires are becoming more legitimate.

[Callum Williams]

There is clearly a very big surge in anti billionaire sentiment.

[Interviewer (Rosie Blore or Host)]

Callum Williams is our senior economics writer.

[Callum Williams]

But what we have found is that there's a growing number of billionaires that are deriving their wealth mainly by providing genuinely useful goods and services or employing millions of people rather than by taking advantage of the system.

[Interviewer (Rosie Blore or Host)]

So there's a lot of anti billionaire sentiment, but not all of it's warranted. How did you reach that conclusion?

[Callum Williams]

Okay, so the first thing to say is this bit of research was not about whether billionaires are are good or bad. We're just looking at whether they're getting better or getting worse over time. And to do that, we look at where billionaires wealth comes from. And broadly speaking, we divide the source of their wealth into the worst kind and the better kind. Now the worst kind is when someone's made a lot of money from say for example, being in the mining industry or being in natural resources, being in casinos, that kind of thing. The kind of industry where you need political favors to get stuff done. And we also in that bucket include people who've inherited most of their wealth. Then in the other bucket we have the good or the better billionaires. And now these are the billionaires who have made their money by creating goods and services and companies that people genuinely like and do deliver some good to the world. You can think of it as on the one hand, uncompetitive wealth, the oligarchs, the heirs, and on the other hand, the competitive billionaire wealth. So people like Taylor Swift, Lionel Messi, the founder of Uniqlo, and basically what we find is that the competitive sector is becoming more and more important over time and the uncompetitive sector is becoming less and less important over time.

[Interviewer (Rosie Blore or Host)]

So these competitive billionaires, those who have made the money for themselves, hopefully without ties or gaming the system, where have they made their money from?

[Callum Williams]

So it's a bunch of different sectors. You might think it was all to do with tech. And yes, there are a lot of people in tech who've made billions of dollars. I mean, Elon Musk being the most obvious example, but there's loads of them. But what I found quite surprising is that actually the tech share of billionaire wealth is not at an all time high. It's actually slightly lower today than it was in the early 2000s. So what is actually happening is that it's a range of different sectors that people are making vast fortunes in. Yes, you do have the people in entertainment, broadly defined, in music and sports, they're one sector. You have a lot of people in finance who've done extremely well. But then you have a bunch of people who have made vast fortunes in industries that don't get a lot of attention. So for example, the founders of Panda Express are multi, multi billionaires. Panda Express is a place that you get noodles and rice for $10, $15. The founder of Uniqlo has tens of billions of dollars. So it's lots and lot like this rather than it all being tech or all being oligarchs.

[Interviewer (Rosie Blore or Host)]

So if it's not the system, why are we seeing such a rise in the self made billionaire?

[Callum Williams]

It's a very good question. And this is the thing that caused me to puzzle the most. China's clearly one thing. China has grown rapidly over the past 25 years, the consumer sector has increased very significantly. So you've got a bunch of people who've become billionaires that way. You've also got the fact that we've had very strong market returns, especially in the US for the past 25 years. And that has just minted a lot of people who say, work in hedge funds and private equity, that kind of thing. But also, if you founded a technology company, the value of the company that you own or you founded has gone up a lot. What you can see is that there's a bunch of people who founded tech companies in the 80s or 90s or 2000s who were billionaires back then, but have become way richer in recent years because the value of their company has just gone up a lot. So that's another thing that's going on. And then the other thing I think is mobile first Internet. What you can see in our data is that the competitive share of billionaire wealth starts to really inflect upwards from the middle of the 2010s, and that perhaps not by coincidence, is the time when global phone usage really took off. And what phones basically allowed people and businesses to do was to scale an idea incredibly fast. So you think of companies like ByteDance in China or Spotify or Stripe. These are companies that went from 0 to 100 very, very fast. So that's another reason why we have so many self made billionaires to the market.

[Interviewer (Rosie Blore or Host)]

You say that these self made billionaires aren't rich because of the system, but surely there are some things about the system that you could still be gaming even if you haven't got your wealth through bribing someone or through getting a whole sector of the economy. For example, you could be paying yourself a lot, you could be not paying taxes. We see a rise in inequality, in inequality of wealth creation and in the amount of tax that. Where does all that come into this?

[Callum Williams]

So I say a few things. One is, if you look at the most egregious forms of billionaire accumulation, those clearly are becoming less powerful. So for example, if you consider billionaires in post Soviet Russia, they are perhaps 20% less wealthy than they were at their peak in the late 2000s, we have clear progress. There's still a huge amount of wealth that's been accumulated illegitimately, but it is less than it was. Then there's the question of are people taking advantage of poor competition policy or screwing over their suppliers or whatever? And that is really a question that pertains to the economy at large rather than just to billionaires. I think the Evidence is unclear as to whether the global economy has become meaningfully less competitive over the past 20 years. And then you have the question of taxes, which again is a subject of a lot of debate. My read of the evidence, at least in the US which has the best data on this, is that billionaires do pay a large share of their income in tax. If you're looking at, say, the top four to 500 people in the US ranked by wealth, they have an effective tax rate of 45 to 50% a year. Now, you might say it should be a lot higher than that. And in this particular bit of research, we're not broaching that question. But it's not clear from looking at the evidence that gaming the economy or gaming the tax system is why so many billionaires are being minted.

[Interviewer (Rosie Blore or Host)]

And yet, of course, wealth taxes are still a really hot topic. Does the fact that more and more billionaires are self made from competitive means, they haven't inherited it, they haven't gamed the system, mean that there's less of a case for a wealth tax?

[Callum Williams]

Okay, so I can see one way in which it makes no difference and two ways in which it does make a difference. So one is, if you're concerned about very rich people having a lot of influence on politics, you it doesn't matter where their money came from. If it's bad, it's bad. But then the other two things. So one is there's a sort of justice argument. It feels much more legitimate to tax someone very heavily if they've accumulated their wealth illegitimately than it does if they've made their money in a good way. And then the other thing is that the economic cost of taxing these people is potentially higher. So if they move away, you are losing genuine entrepreneurs rather than people who've just screwed over the system. Lionel Messi moves away from your country because the tax system is unfavourable to him. Your country's football team will be worse. And if you lose the owners of Panda Express, you're going to have worse quality takeaway Asian food than you did before. So there's clearly more of a cost of doing this. So I think in that sense too, the argument for wealth tax does become less powerful.

[Interviewer (Rosie Blore or Host)]

Callum, thank you very much.

[Callum Williams]

Thanks, Rosie.

[Rosie Blore]

And speaking of billionaires, earlier this week our editor in chief, Sani Minton Beddoes, interviewed Elon Musk for the Insider, our video offering. If you're a subscriber, you can watch that interview later today or hear an audio version of it in the same feed. As you're listening to this podcast and on tomorrow's show, we'll hear from Zanny about what she made of that discussion.

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[Su Lin Wong]

Cambodia's government has been facing growing international pressure to crack down on industrial scale scamming, often run by organized criminal gangs from China, and that's led to an uptick in police and military raids. Journalists are often invited to these newly empty compounds to see banks of phones and computers, targets for scam profits, and lists and lists of phone numbers for scammers to call.

[Rosie Blore]

Su Lin Wong reported our Scam Inc. Podcast series and is our Asia correspondent.

[Su Lin Wong]

But those selective enforcement has toppled some scam compounds. The system that protects them is still in place and the industry is adapting rather than dying, with operations shifting to Laos and Myanmar, which are the other main hosts of the world's scam compounds, and to new countries like Sri Lanka and Indonesia.

[Interviewer (Rosie Blore or Host)]

Su Lian I'm sure that all of our listeners have listened to your fantastic podcast series Scam Inc. But for those that haven't, the rare few just tell us what you mean by scam compounds. Scamming as an industry who's being targeted and how?

[Su Lin Wong]

When you receive a message on WhatsApp asking if you've picked up your latest delivery or if you're free to meet for coffee still on Wednesday, that isn't some random guy in a hoodie sitting in his parents basement, that is a message being sent by an incredibly sophisticated industry that we labeled Scam Inc. In our podcast series that came out last year. And this industry is now estimated to make more than US$500 billion a year globally, where you have these sophisticated criminal gangs, mostly based in Southeast Asia, targeting victims all over the world, whether they're in Europe or the US or elsewhere. That means that this industry is now roughly the same size as the global illicit drug trade. And so it's really important that think of this as an industry.

[Interviewer (Rosie Blore or Host)]

You started off by talking about Cambodia as a center for this scam industry. Why is it such a hub?

[Su Lin Wong]

So online scams in Cambodia alone are estimated to generate up to US$19 billion a year for the country, which would make it equivalent to 40% of the country's formal GDP, bigger than Cambodia's garment manufacturing industry, which is its largest legitimate industry. So scamming actually started in. It was mostly Chinese criminals targeting ordinary Chinese citizens. And about 10 years ago, the government had enough and really cracked down. And as a result, these criminals were pushed out across Southeast Asia, including to Cambodia. So Cambodia's Information Minister was saying that over the past year, the government has closed more than 90 casinos. The point that he's trying to make there is that scam operations are often run from inside casinos, which then also help launder the proceeds and the profits made. The government has been very keen to show over the past few months that it's really trying to address the scam center epidemic. And we've been seeing a lot more publicity around raids. There have been tens of thousands of lower level scammers who have been released from inside these prison like conditions, but now have nowhere to go and no money to buy plane tickets home. And there really is this humanitarian crisis on the streets of Cambodia Now, Su

[Interviewer (Rosie Blore or Host)]

Lin, as part of that crackdown, there was a big name in the scam world extradited earlier this year from Cambodia to China. Can you tell me about the significance of that?

[Su Lin Wong]

So Chenzhi is believed to be the boss of one of Asia's most powerful criminal organizations. And this organization was headquartered in Cambodia. The US Government, the UK government both sanctioned him, but ultimately he was extradited not to America or Britain, but to China. Chen is infamous for his empire of online fraud and was also notably an advisor to Hun Sen, Cambodia's longtime strongman. And so this extradition of Chunzhi from Cambodia to China really spooked other scam bosses in Cambodia. The message was that, you know, Hun Sen, the most powerful person in Cambodia, wasn't able to protect his own advisor, Chunzhi. And so who else then was going to be safe? So as a result, a lot of these Scam bosses fled. They left the gates to their brutal scam compounds unlocked, and this mass exodus of workers flooded onto the streets. The story of Chengu didn't stop there. Beyond the US and the UK imposing sanctions on Chengu and his associates, Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan and Thailand have also done so. The US government seized around $15 billion in cryptocurrency from Chengzhu, which was the largest ever seizure in U.S. history. They've sanctioned Kok Anh, a Cambodian senator, and they've continued to roll out more sanctions. Just in June, they blocked subsidiaries of Huiwon Group. Hweiwan is considered the world's largest illicit marketplace. Its whole group as well as its subsidiaries are now blocked from America's financial system.

[Interviewer (Rosie Blore or Host)]

How has Cambodia as a hub of scamming, but also the crackdown now affected other industries within the country.

[Su Lin Wong]

So one big industry for Cambodia is tourism. And the number of Chinese tourists has really dramatically fallen over the past few years because they are now so scared of being trafficked into scam camps. So before COVID Cambodia received 2.4 million Chinese tourists in 2019, but that number dropped to 850,000 in 2024. And so Cambodia is now trying to do a bunch of things to attract Chinese tourists again. For example, it's now offering them visa free entries in a bid to revive the tourism industry.

[Interviewer (Rosie Blore or Host)]

So despite all this crackdown, it sounds like they're nowhere near getting to the bottom of this problem.

[Su Lin Wong]

That's absolutely right. And in fact, Amnesty International counted 86 scam compounds in Cambo this year, up from 53 a year earlier, which I think shows that the industry is adapting rather than dying. This isn't necessarily a new kind of cycle that we're seeing with scams. There are many, many other examples throughout Cambodian history where there was a selective crackdown on an illegal industry. And once international pressure shifted away, the illegal industry continued to flourish. So I'm thinking of sand mining or illegal logging or land grabbing. And so I fear that we're going to see a similar pattern with scams. And then I think the most important point is we haven't yet seen any ministers who are protecting and enabling Scam Inc. Being sanctioned, detained, arrested by their own government. And unless and until we see that, I think Cambodia will continue to be a huge hub for online scams and other cybercrimes.

[Interviewer (Rosie Blore or Host)]

Su Lin, thank you so much for talking to me.

[Su Lin Wong]

Thanks, Rosie.

[Rosie Blore]

If you haven't already listened to our

[Interviewer (Rosie Blore or Host)]

podcast series, Scam Inc.

[Rosie Blore]

I would very much urge you to do so. Extraordinary storytelling with some rather useful warnings for us all you'll need to be a subscriber. The link is in the show notes.

[Journalist/Reporter]

So if you look down through the gate here, you can see a policeman and that police officer is stood outside the door of number 10. So behind the police officer is an archway.

[Chris Impey]

This is what my journalistic career has come down to. Trying to entice a feline over to the press pen on Downing Street.

[Rosie Blore]

Chris Impey is our cat correspondent and one of the Intelligence's editors.

[Chris Impey]

See, now I'm just really embarrassed. I've got a packet of Dreamies with tasty chicken. Somehow he's going to sense there's something good waiting outside for him. Doors opening. It's not Harry, it's a guy in trainers. He comes out of 10 Downing street wearing a pair of trainers I dressed up for today. I'm going to ask the policeman with a gun. Hold on.

[Journalist]

Excuse me, has Larry been around this morning? Yeah, he was, yeah. It's a real life wildlife show, isn't it? You have to get that right shot. It takes hours and hours and hours to get it.

[Chris Impey]

Yeah, we'll. We'll stick around.

[Journalist]

Larry the Cat is Chief Mouser to the Cabinet Office. That's his official title. He's been in Post for 15 years. He was there for Brexit and David Cameron's resignation and the rumor that somehow

[Callum Williams]

I don't love Larry.

[Larry the Cat Narrator]

I do.

[Callum Williams]

And I have photographic evidence to prove him.

[Journalist]

Theresa May's resignation.

[Interviewer (Rosie Blore or Host)]

Can the other part on the left,

[Journalist]

Ranveer, Very dramatic news is happening right behind you. I think the cat's come out. Boris Johnson's resignation.

[Larry the Cat Narrator]

Thank you everybody who's helped look after me in my over the last three years, including Dylan the dog. And I just say to my party, if Dylan and Larry can put behind them their occasional difficulties, then so can the Conservative Party.

[Journalist]

His relationship with Liz Truss was all too brief. Rishi Sunak made a Home Alone themed Christmas video with Larry that no one asked for. And Sakir Starmer played up their friendship.

[Callum Williams]

I'll tell you a story about Larry the Cat because Larry has been in Downing street for a long time.

[Journalist]

Andy Burnham is his seventh prime minister.

[Chris Impey]

That's a man with a gun I just spoke to. He likes Larry. He's here to protect Larry. Maybe we can get him to shout through the letterbox, Larry, the Economist's here for you.

[Journalist]

They've got some cat treats.

[Larry the Cat Narrator]

Is he a Tory cat?

[Journalist]

Larry may be elusive, but there are lessons he can offer the new tenant of Downing street about how to survive in the world of politics, first of all, have a good backstory. Like many an effective political operator, Larry came from the wrong side of the tracks. He was plucked from the obscurity of Battersea cats and dogs home, and he arrived at Downing street in a big blue lorry with the press eager to get a glimpse. But he was obscured by a blanket.

[Journalist/Reporter]

Can you lift the COVID off so we can see the cats, please, Larry, please.

[Larry the Cat Narrator]

We see Larry.

[Journalist/Reporter]

This isn't Dan's bit. My need to know. This isn't going so well.

[Journalist]

Lesson number two, either do the job well or maintain the perception that you are. Larry is street wise. He's known as a bit of a bruiser, but his mousing instincts are much debated. So just this week he had a successful kill. Photos of it everywhere, but behind closed doors, there's a bit of skepticism. His official government page notes his solution to the rodent problem remains in the tactical planning stage and that he often tests antique furniture for napping quality. Lesson three, steal the spotlight. Larry the Cat is an Internet darling. He's got over 900,000 followers on his unofficial X account and he's frequently sent gifts by his adoring fans. He's also media savvy. He keeps journalists at a tail's length, slinking away from any of us who approach him. And he also knows how to exploit media opportunities as well. So he's photobombed world leaders, most notably Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine. And in 2019, he stole the headlines by sheltering from the rain underneath the beast President Donald Trump's armored limousine. A final lesson for Andy, suffer no challenges. Larry had a long running feud with Palmerston, who was the chief mouser at the Foreign Office, and it culminated in a well documented fight. Lowry reportedly lost his collar. Palmerston hurt his ear. Larry was also judiciously kept away from Keir Starmer's two cats. And Andy Burnham has a rescue dog called Axel, who is said to be rather skittish. And Axl would also do well to keep his distance from Larry. Such canny political manoeuvring has blessed Larry with public approval ratings that most politicians would sell their cat for. But his whiskers are graying. In cat years. Larry is about 92, so Winston Churchill was a sprightly 80 when he left office. Unlike many British leaders, the chief mouser looks set to exit on his own terms.

[Chris Impey]

I did mention to the number 10 Downing street press team today that we were coming to talk to Larry, so you would have thought he would have been notified and that he would have come out at the appointed time. Stood up by the Downing street cat. We did get to see lots of guns. We didn't see a cat. I think we've seen 10 or 20 guns. The most popular member of the Cabinet Office refused to talk to the Economist.

[Rosie Blore]

That's all for this episode of the Intelligence we'll see you back here tomorrow.

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