Pushkin.

Audiences have always loved a spy story, be it the third man, the born identity,

or of course, James Bond, espionage as a recipe for a box office hit.

And I've recently been enjoying an excellent spy thriller,

but unlike those examples, this one is completely true,

and the spy at the centre of the story is certainly no James Bond.

My Financial Times colleague Sam Jones has been on the trail of

an Austrian financial fraudster who ran intelligence networks across Europe for Russia.

The result is the fantastic podcast, Hot Money, Agent of Chaos. I have loved listening to it. I think you will too, but before we play

you the very first episode on the Cautionary Tales feed, I've got Sam Jones himself with me to

wet your appetite. Hello, Sam. Hey, Tim. Nice to be here. Well, it's great to have you. And we should

start by covering your role at the Financial Times. I can't remember the actual job title.

You're basically the spy correspondent, aren't you?

I mean, that's a fair description. The cover description is European security correspondent, but yeah.

Oh, yes.

Covering intelligence and espionage.

Are there any spy stories you can briefly share that do not involve the subject of agents of chaos?

Yeah, a few. I mean, I properly used to cover security and defense for the FT sort of 2013 to 18, which was an interesting period.

Obviously, that's when Russia first invaded Ukraine, and also

when the crisis in the Middle East with the civil war in Syria blew up. So there was a lot going

on, especially with Ukraine, that felt like the moment where, you know, the whole kind of geopolitical

saga we're now right in the kind of center of began to first play out, began to first unspool.

...