🌊 United States of Shrinking?

Introducing the AI era of internet scams, starring Brad Pitt.

A French woman was tricked into sending $850k to a scammer posing as Brad Pitt. The scammer first pretended to be Brad Pitt’s mom, messaging the woman after she posted photos from a ski trip, “My son needs someone like you.” The scammer then messaged her as Brad Pitt and eventually convinced her to send $850k for cancer treatment, using AI to send Brad Pitt-lookalike selfies that confirmed her story. On top of this, the French woman divorced her millionaire husband in the process.

We can’t wait for the movie about this. It’s gonna be called… Fraud Club.

–Max and Max

KEY STORY

Hottest Year On Record

2024 recorded the highest average global temperatures on record

• Modern reliable global temperature records date to around 1880, making 2024 the hottest in ~140 years

• 2024 was around 0.2 of a degree F (0.1 of a degree C) warmer than 2023. NASA says that this past year was between 2.5-2.9°F (1.4-1.6°C) warmer than global pre-industrial levels in the 1800s – making 2024’s temperatures the first to meet or exceed the 2.7°F (1.5°C) threshold set by the Paris Agreement

• Temperatures are expected to cool in 2025 due to the La Niña phenomenon, which is cooling oceans

Dig Deeper

• Many scientists say that exceeding the 2.7°F benchmark could impact sea levels, extreme weather events, ecosystems, food security, and more

• While most scientists predict the earth will keep getting warmer in the coming years due to global fossil fuel consumption, not all agree: A minority rebuke the consensus and argue that rising temperatures are part of natural variability and that the earth isn’t as sensitive to CO2 as mainstream models suggest, among other things

KEY STORY

Musk: TikTok’s Savior?

Chinese officials are considering using Elon Musk as a broker to save TikTok from an impending US ban

• The discussions come days before the January 19 deadline when ByteDance must sell TikTok's US operations or face a shutdown

• Per Bloomberg, China is considering a sale of the app to Musk outright; per other reports, China is considering using Musk as a middle-man to persuade Trump not to enact the ban or to broker a deal with another buyer

• The talks have been described as "very preliminary and mostly brainstorming"; TikTok has labeled the reports “pure fiction”

Dig Deeper 

• While Bytedance claims to be independent from China’s government, the latter holds a so-called “golden share” that lets it influence major strategy and operations. To date, it’s been reported that China’s government opposes any sale of the app

• Beyond serving as one of Trump’s closest advisers and financial backers, Musk regularly holds meeting with senior Chinese officials, often related to Tesla’s significant manufacturing presence in China

ROCA’S SPONSOR

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• Dollar Flight Club provides alerts when flights you’re interested in dip in price. Their (free) service has helped us and many others save up to 90% on travel

• This winter, we’re partnering with them to give away a trip to Lake Tahoe

• It’s free to enter with no strings attached. Just sign up here for their free flight price tracking and you’ll be automatically entered to win

KEY STORY

Spain’s Tax Wall

Spain's government announced plans to impose a 100% tax on property purchases by non-EU citizens who don't live in the bloc

• The measure aims to tackle the country's housing crisis, where prices have risen 48% in the past decade – twice the increase in incomes

• The prime minister described the proposal as an attempt to fix a “grave” housing crisis, while some analysts questioned the effectiveness of targeting non-EU buyers, who account for 27,000 annual purchases in a market of 26M homes

• The proposal requires parliamentary approval, which it may not receive

Dig Deeper

• The measure was one of several housing-related proposals announced by the PM. Currently, property buyers pay between 7-12% in various taxes, depending on the region and whether the home is new or existing

KEY STORY

US Population to Slip

Due to lower birth and immigration rates, the US population will grow at a significantly slower rate over the next few decades than previously thought, per the Congressional Budget Office (CBO)

• A country needs a birth rate of 2.1 kids per woman to be at replacement. The US’ birth rate slipped from 1.7 to 1.6 in 2023, putting it well below replacement rate

• The US grows because of immigration, though the CBO lowered its immigration forecast, too

• The CBO projects the US’ population will grow to 372M in 30 years, down from the previous estimate of 383M. The current US population is 335M

Dig Deeper

• “Without immigration, the population would shrink beginning in 2033, in part because fertility rates are projected to remain too low for a generation to replace itself,” the CBO said

• The CBO cut its immigration projections due to recent executive actions. Over the longer term, the CBO expects immigration to add about 1.1M people to the US population per year, about 42,000 fewer than it projected a year ago

• These projections do not account for Trump's mass deportation plans

RUNDOWN
Some Quick Stories for the Office

💰 Mark Zuckerberg announced that Meta is raising its work standards and will replace the bottom-performing 5% of staff, or 3,600 employees

🇺🇸 While testifying before Congress, defense secretary appointee Pete Hegseth said that, if confirmed, his focus would be on “getting anything that doesn’t contribute to meritocracy out of how decisions are made inside the Pentagon…what gender you are, what race you are, your views on climate change…should have no bearing on whether you get promoted.” He spent much of the testimony defending himself against sexual assault and infidelity allegations

👸 Catherine, the Princess of Wales, confirmed that she is “in remission” from cancer

👗 A BBC investigation found that staff producing clothes for Shein, the booming Chinese fast-fashion company, typically work 75 hours a week and get one day off monthly

COMMUNITY
What does Roca Nation think?

🧠 Yesterday’s question: On the Meta story, should social media platforms allow users to claim the Earth is flat on their platforms? How about “vaccines cause autism”? What about “all cops are bastards”?

🧐 Today’s question: Who’s the most dishonest person in the media? Or the one who annoys you the most?

Reply to this email with your response!

POPCORN
Some Quick Stories for Happy Hour

⛱️ Mystery Balls Return: Mysterious marble-sized grey-and-white balls have forced the closure of nine Sydney beaches just months after similar black balls shut down beaches there

🇦🇪 No Slacking Here: Estonian daredevil Jaan Roose completed a 100-meter (328-foot) slackline walk between Dubai's Emirates Towers at a height of 224 meters (700 feet)

🚌 Bus-ted Identity: A Rhode Island woman said a school bus monitor tried to drop off the wrong child at her home, then attempted to pass off the same child with a different backpack as her 3-year-old son

📱 ChatGPT Think It’s Turning Japanese: OpenAI's new reasoning model, "o1," has been observed spontaneously switching to Chinese, Persian, and other languages while solving problems, even when questions are asked in English

🇵🇷 Liberate Puerto Rico: Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro said his country seeks to “liberate” Puerto Rico from American control

ROCA WRAP

Northern Swarms

Sweden

This Scandinavian nation will test new autonomous drone swarm technology.

A Nordic country of 10.4M people, Sweden ended centuries of military non-alignment by joining NATO in March 2024 in response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine. The nation is rapidly modernizing its military capabilities and plans to increase defense spending from 2.2% of GDP last year to 2.6% by 2028.

The latest example of the country’s military upgrade came on Monday, when Defense Minister Pal Jonson announced that the armed forces would test new drone swarm technology developed jointly with defense manufacturer (and former consumer car company) Saab. The system allows groups of drones of various sizes to form autonomous units capable of conducting reconnaissance, positioning, and identification tasks.

The technology, developed over the past year, will be tested during the upcoming Arctic Strike military exercise.

The drone program represents Sweden's growing focus on advanced military technology as it integrates into NATO and seeks to deter a conflict in what for 80 years has been arguably the world’s most stable region.

EDITOR’S NOTE
Final Thoughts

Mistake from yesterday: In the intro, we said the rerouted Ryanair flight was destined for a Caribbean island when it was actually destined for Lanzarote, an island off the western coast of Africa. Thank you for the two hawk-eyed readers who pointed that out. It seems the only people who need a two-drink limit are Max and Max before writing this newsletter!

Have a great day.

–Max and Max