The alleged scam, organized by a 24-year-old from Philadelphia, offered athletes ownership of bogus websites as a place to park cash from their lucrative careers.
The Unanswered Questions Driving the Stock Market Drop
The biggest problems aren’t caused by what you don’t know, but what, as Mark Twain put it, “you know for sure that just ain’t so.” And that’s a massive problem for the stock market right now.
Andy Burnham is to become Britain’s seventh prime minister in a decade, having secured the Labour leadership with the landslide support of his party’s MPs.
The former Manchester mayor is now set to replace Starmer as Labour leader on Friday before walking through the doors of No 10 and becoming prime minister next Monday.
For our big story this week, Daniel Boffey looks at how Burnham charted the route from school politics to No 10, while Jessica Elgot runs through the bulging in-tray awaiting him when he steps into the new role. And Gaby Hinsliff examines how the PM-in-waiting might fare on the global stage, asking whether, unlike Keir Starmer, he has the skills to deal with Donald Trump.
Spotlight | A revolution in ruins Discontent with Venezuela’s Trump-backed government is mounting as Chávez heirs struggle to respond to the earthquake disaster, writes Tom Phillips
Science | We’re going on a water bear hunt Scientists hope DNA sequencing tardigrades – tiny yet virtually indestructible creatures – could help us understand the secrets of their superpowers. Patrick Barkham reports
Feature | The battle of the Bell hotel Tim Burrows visits the town of Epping in Essex to hear from local people about the impact of last year’s far-right protests that centred on a hotel housing asylum seekers
Opinion | The real source of Trump’s power exposed The Nato summit showed the US president’s willingness to violate all norms, rules and laws – and leave everyone else to pick up the pieces, argues Robert Reich
Culture | Never-ending story With Christopher Nolan’s take on the Odyssey set to break box office records, Charlotte Higgins asks why a poem from 600BC holds a vice-like grip on pop culture
Investment, organisation and effort can guarantee secure water supplies for everyone in Britain, argues Lord Deben
The power of water
Kate Green surveys the surging strength of the Severn Bore, the haunting beauty of the flooded Somerset Levels, life on the edge at Dawlish and the capital’s mighty Thames Barrier.
Why every drop counts
People who work with water tell Kate Green and Mary Skipwith why we need to reconnect with our most precious resource
Up with the gulls, to bed with the owl
Patrick Galbraith experiences an eventful day in the life of the ever-changing, but enduringly beautiful Cley estuary in Norfolk
On peak form
Artists such as Turner, Bierstadt and Wolf took painting to new heights with their depictions of mountains, finds Michael Prodger
Let all the world sing
The 2026 BBC Proms promises to be a truly global spectacle, as Henrietta Bredin discovers
The queen of spas
Scarborough in North Yorkshire is the original Victorian seaside resort. Kathryn Ferry charts the development of its spa complex
The Revd Sam Wells’s favourite painting
The St Martin-in-the-Fields vicar chooses a painting where ‘magnificent humanity’ is laid bare
Country-house treasure
John Goodall unearths evidence of Bowood in Wiltshire’s wartime role as a ‘beacon of recovery’
Pooling assets
George Plumptre is charmed by the Anglo-Italian landscape at Renishaw Hall in Derbyshire
The legacy
Agnes Stamp pays tribute to speed merchant Sir Max Aitken, the king of British powerboating
Winging it
Mark Cocker assesses the anti-social antics of the herring gull
Luxury
Jonathan Self ponders the power of fine jewellery and Amie Elizabeth White finds coral for all
Interiors
Arabella Youens visits a kitchen giving a nod to history, and reveals that chequerboard floors are back
Travel
Rosie Paterson is looking for a New England in Nantucket
Arts & antiques
Carla Passino investigates the intriguing tale of ‘Mad Madge’, a pioneer of science-fiction
Truth, lies and somewhere in between
Michael Billington delves into a world of deceit and infidelity
America’s centennial in 1876 was celebrated with a grand exhibition that projected an image of national unity and inventiveness in the anxious aftermath of civil war and recession.
Centennial: The Great Fair of 1876 and the Invention of America’s Future by Fergus M. Bordewich
Quinn Slobodian and Ben Tarnoff’s Muskism examines how Elon Musk became the world’s first trillionaire, by selling a vision of the future that very few people would want to inhabit.
Muskism: A Guide for the Perplexed by Quinn Slobodian and Ben Tarnoff
In case you missed Donald Trump’s triumphalist address marking America’s 250th anniversary, you weren’t alone. Lightning storms caused by an extreme heatwave sent the Washington crowds scattering and delayed the US president’s address by four hours – but it was still a trademark piece of Trumpian dystopia, a highly politicised polemic that followed on from a white nationalist march on the streets of the capital.
David Smith’s brilliant feature essay this week reveals how the US president has hijacked the country’s milestone anniversary and turned it into a joyless, farcical series of largely self-serving events. And from Moscow to Mexico City, there’s a terrific reported feature from our correspondents around the globe on how the world views America at 250 in the age of Trump.
Spotlight | At the ayatollah’s funeral, Iranians call for revenge Crowds swelled through Tehran as mourners dressed in black carried flags proclaiming: ‘We will rise’, reports diplomatic editor Patrick Wintour
Environment | The changing symphony of Britain’s dawn chorus The country has lost an estimated 73 million wild birds from its landscape over the last 50 years, but a new project aims to recreate their sound. By Sandra Laville and Madeleine Finlay
Feature | Morality and the machine Since 2017, philosopher Iason Gabriel has worked at Google DeepMind, trying to anticipate – and think through – the impact of AI. But as commercial and geopolitical pressures escalate, can ethicists make any difference, asks Robert P Baird
Opinion | Thank heavens for the pope In a political wasteland dominated by billionaires, war criminals and mega-corporations, the head of the Catholic church is a rare figure of moral leadership, argues Simon Tisdall
Culture | An invitation you can’t refuse Director Olivia Wilde and co-star Edward Norton talk to Catherine Shoard aboutThe Invite, their new movie about marital bed death that is the season’s buzziest, funniest release
Hold off on that online-shopping impulse buy — there’s no substitute for carefully crafted quality
It’s getting hot in here
Ben Lerwill sets his tastebuds a-tingling as he meets the British chilli-sauce makers adding to the spice of life
Luxury
If you only buy one suitcase, make it a classic GlobeTrotter, suggests Amie Elizabeth White
Winging it
Mark Cocker looks beyond the raven’s grim reputation to seek the truth about our largest corvid
Sir Lindsay Hoyle’s favourite painting
The Speaker of the House of Commons is captivated by the Westminster riverfront in a work with a photographic quality
On top of the world
Kirsty Fergusson applauds the stamina of the hardy souls who tend the spectacular clifftop gardens at Chygurno, Cornwall
Country-house treasure
John Goodall stands in the stead of William Tyndale behind a preacher’s pulpit at Bucklebury House in Berkshire
The legacy
Agnes Stamp salutes Agnes Marshall, the Queen of Ices
While the cat’s away…
David Glasper lifts the lid on the cat flap, the means by which the regal feline can come and go precisely as it pleases
An architectural evolution
Jeremy Musson charts the rise of Selwyn College, Cambridge, from its origins as a memorial to a 19th-century missionary
The raw deal
Tom Parker Bowles savours the lip-smacking summer freshness of that Peruvian classic ceviche
Travel
Rosie Paterson unpacks the latest in luxury-yacht looks and follows in Frida Kahlo’s footsteps
Arts & antiques
Beauty and function were fused in the form of the sedan chair, the conveyance of choice for the upper echelons of Georgian society, reveals Carla Passino
Art to dine for
Intriguing art can be a meal-time conversation starter in country-house dining rooms, as Melanie Cable-Alexander discovers
Catch of the day
Collector Paul Martin shares his tips on amassing a school of exquisite antiquarian fish prints
Secretary of State Marco Rubio acknowledged that the agreement marked only “the beginning of the beginning” of negotiations between Israel and Lebanon.