Andy Burnham has used one of his first acts as Prime Minister to speak to Donald Trump, Downing Street has confirmed, as speculation mounts that Labour’s block on fresh North Sea oil and gas operations could be about to soften. For the thousands of UK firms in the offshore supply chain, the stakes are anything but abstract.

The US President appears to be taking a much closer interest in the new occupant of No 10 amid hints that Mr Burnham could reverse the party’s ban on new drilling.

Yesterday, the Mail on Sunday reported that the Prime Minister was preparing to announce plans for new drilling at the Jackdaw and Rosebank fields off the coast of Scotland, two projects where licences have already been granted but which have been mired in legal challenge.

Mr Trump greeted the reports with characteristic restraint. Writing on TruthSocial, he declared that the people of Aberdeen, the UK’s oil and gas capital, would be ‘dancing in the streets’, and claimed the move would make Britain ‘one of the richest countries anywhere in the world’.

It is quite the change of tune. The President previously dismissed Mr Burnham as an ‘extremely liberal’ politician he knew only as ‘the mayor of a town’.

Riches or otherwise, the commercial logic for Aberdeen is real. Oil and gas supports an estimated 13 per cent of jobs in Aberdeen City, according to ONS figures cited by the House of Commons Library, and behind every operator sits a long tail of small engineering firms, caterers, logistics providers and consultancies whose order books rise and fall with drilling activity.

That supply chain has spent two years absorbing punishment. When Rachel Reeves raised the energy profits levy to 78 per cent and stripped out investment allowances in 2024, industry leaders warned the sector was entering ‘game over’ territory, with analysts cautioning that companies would freeze investment and wind down older fields early. Any signal that Jackdaw and Rosebank can proceed would be the first meaningful reversal of that squeeze.

Caution is warranted, however. Labour’s deputy leader Lucy Powell declined to confirm the reports, telling the BBC she was not expecting a “change of policy” but “more a change of emphasis”. Because licences at both fields were granted some time ago, ministers could wave the projects through while leaving the wider ban on new exploration licences untouched.

For SME owners watching from well beyond Aberdeen, the episode is a useful early read on the new Prime Minister. Mr Burnham arrived in office with eight in ten SME owners braced for what his premiership would mean for their business, yet he has since signalled room for movement on tax and a business rates cut for high street firms. A pragmatic turn on the North Sea would suggest the interventionist of the campaign trail is governing rather closer to the centre.

There is also the small matter of Washington. A Prime Minister who has the President’s ear, even one won over by an oil field, is better placed to defend UK exporters in any future tariff skirmish than one dismissed as the mayor of a town.

Nothing is confirmed, and No 10 is saying little about what the two men discussed. But when a new Prime Minister’s first calls include the White House, and the White House is talking about British oil, business owners can be forgiven for concluding that the direction of travel has changed.

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Jaiprakash Power Ventures shares rallied as much as 8.4% on Tuesday, hitting an intraday high of Rs 18.32, after the company reported robust earnings for the June quarter (Q1FY27). Strong growth in both revenue and profit, coupled with a return to profitability on a sequential basis, boosted investor sentiment.

The company reported consolidated revenue from operations of Rs 1,775.70 crore for the June 2026 quarter, registering a 12.2% year-on-year (YoY) increase from Rs 1,583.16 crore in the corresponding quarter last year. Sequentially, revenue climbed 28.1% from Rs 1,386.43 crore reported in the March quarter.

Consolidated net profit surged 68.6% YoY to Rs 468.84 crore, compared with Rs 278.13 crore in the year-ago period. The company also returned to profitability on a quarter-on-quarter basis after posting a net loss of Rs 13.37 crore in the preceding quarter.

The company’s core power segment remained the primary driver of revenue growth.

Stock performance

Despite Tuesday’s sharp rally, Jaiprakash Power’s stock has delivered a mixed performance across different timeframes. The stock has declined around 6% over the past three months and is down nearly 17% over the last year. However, it has generated impressive long-term returns, surging about 198% over the past three years.

The company currently commands a market capitalisation of Rs 11,582 crore. Its 52-week high stands at Rs 24.45, while the 52-week low is Rs 13.14.

Technical indicators

From a technical perspective, the stock’s 14-day Relative Strength Index (RSI) stands at 38.8. An RSI reading below 30 is generally considered oversold, while a reading above 70 indicates overbought conditions.

The stock also continues to exhibit positive technical momentum, trading above seven of its eight simple moving averages (SMAs), suggesting an underlying bullish trend.

Institutional investors raise stake

Institutional investors increased their exposure to the company during the June 2026 quarter. Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) raised their stake to 6.75% from 6.58% in the previous quarter, while mutual funds increased their holdings to 0.48% from 0.41%.
The promoters’ pledged shareholding remained unchanged at 72.99% of their holdings during the June 2026 quarter, while their overall stake in the company stood at 24%.(Disclaimer: Recommendations, suggestions, views and opinions given by the experts are their own. These do not represent the views of Economic Times)

Wordle players looking for help with today’s puzzle can find hints, clues and the full solution below for Wordle #1858, the daily word puzzle released Tuesday, July 21, 2026.

Wordle challenges players to identify a five-letter word within six attempts, with the game providing color-coded feedback after each guess to indicate which letters are correct and properly placed, which letters appear in the word but in the wrong position, and which letters do not appear in the word at all. A new puzzle becomes available daily at midnight local time, meaning players around the world receive access to that day’s word at different moments depending on their time zone.

Hints for today’s Wordle

For players who want a nudge in the right direction without having the answer fully revealed, several outlets covering today’s puzzle offered a series of progressive hints. According to those hints, today’s word contains just one vowel among its five letters, a relatively uncommon structure that can make the puzzle trickier to solve through standard guessing strategies. That single vowel, the letter I, sits in the third position of the word.

Today’s word also contains one repeated letter, with both instances of that letter appearing consecutively at the very end of the word. The puzzle begins with the letters “SH,” the same opening combination found in common words such as “share,” “shout” and “shrug,” a detail that several outlets suggested could help narrow down potential guesses.

A definitional clue

Beyond the structural hints, coverage of today’s puzzle also offered a definitional clue tied to the word’s meaning, which centers on deception or hidden promotional motives. According to that hint, the word describes someone who secretly promotes a product, scheme, or point of view while presenting themselves as an impartial or unaffiliated observer. The term is commonly used in discussions of online scams, influencer marketing, and situations involving undisclosed sponsorships or hidden financial incentives.

Today’s Wordle answer

The answer to Wordle #1858 for July 21, 2026, is SHILL.

As both a noun and a verb, “shill” refers to someone who poses as an enthusiastic, impartial customer or supporter of something, such as at an auction, a street game, or an online promotion, while secretly working on behalf of the seller or organizer to encourage others to participate. As a verb, to “shill” means to act in that deceptive promotional capacity, or more broadly, to promote something in a misleading way for personal gain.

The word has seen a notable rise in everyday usage in recent years, particularly within the context of social media, where undisclosed sponsored content and hidden brand partnerships have brought increased public attention to the practice of “shilling” products or ideas without full transparency about financial or personal incentives involved.

Puzzle difficulty

According to Wordlebot, the New York Times’ internal tool that analyzes daily Wordle difficulty based on aggregate player performance, today’s puzzle carried an average difficulty rating of 4.4 out of a possible 6 guesses, suggesting most players needed a moderate number of attempts to reach the correct answer. The puzzle’s relatively unusual letter structure, featuring only a single vowel and a doubled final consonant, likely contributed to that above-average difficulty level for many solvers.

About Wordle

Wordle, now owned and published by The New York Times, has become one of the most widely played daily word games since it first gained viral popularity in early 2022. The game’s simple format, one puzzle per day shared by all players regardless of location, has helped fuel its continued popularity, as solvers frequently compare results and maintain personal solving streaks across social media platforms.

Players looking for extra help with future puzzles can typically find daily hints and starter word suggestions published by various gaming and puzzle-focused outlets shortly after each day’s Wordle becomes available, offering a way to work through the puzzle with partial guidance rather than having the answer revealed outright.

Other daily puzzles

For players interested in additional daily word and logic puzzles beyond Wordle, The New York Times also publishes several other games on a similar daily schedule, including Connections, a puzzle that challenges players to identify hidden groupings among a set of words, and Strands, a word-search-style puzzle built around a central theme, or “spangram.” Tuesday’s editions of both games, Connections puzzle number 1136 and Strands puzzle number 870, were also published alongside today’s Wordle, offering solvers additional options as part of their daily puzzle routine.

With today’s Wordle answer now solved, a new puzzle will become available at midnight local time Wednesday, continuing the game’s now-familiar daily rhythm. Players looking to maintain their solving streaks or simply enjoy the daily challenge can expect a fresh five-letter word and accompanying set of clues from various outlets to help guide their next attempt, regardless of whether today’s puzzle proved to be a quick solve or a more challenging one given its unusual single-vowel structure.

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New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani said Monday that the International Criminal Court’s arrest warrant against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should be honored, directly contradicting an assurance from President Donald Trump earlier the same day that Netanyahu would face no arrest while in the United States.

Speaking at a press conference, Mamdani reiterated his position on the warrant in direct terms. “If someone is charged with a warrant by the International Criminal Court for these kinds of crimes, that’s something I believe should be honored. And I’ve also said that we will follow our local laws,” Mamdani said.

Trump’s assurance to Netanyahu

Mamdani’s comments came hours after Trump posted on Truth Social that Netanyahu “will not be arrested, in any way, shape, or form, while in the United States of America.” Trump’s post did not name Mamdani directly, though it came amid the mayor’s continued public statements about the ICC warrant, and credited Israel with assisting the United States in its ongoing military conflict with Iran.

Trump later told reporters that he had no tension with Spain’s prime minister, Pedro Sanchez, despite having ordered a halt to trade with Madrid and criticizing Spain as a partner within NATO, remarks made during the same public appearance in which he addressed the Netanyahu situation.

Mamdani’s escalating rhetoric

Mamdani went further in describing the basis for his position, characterizing Netanyahu in stark terms tied to the war in Gaza. “We’re speaking about someone who’s the subject of an International Criminal Court arrest warrant. And he’s the subject of this arrest warrant for alleged crimes against humanity, for war crimes, and he’s the architect of the genocide against Palestinians in Gaza as Israel’s prime minister,” Mamdani said.

The mayor’s comments Monday represented a continuation of positions he first articulated during his mayoral campaign, when he said he would direct police to arrest Netanyahu if the Israeli leader set foot in New York City, framing the move as straightforward enforcement of the existing ICC warrant. Since taking office, Mamdani has confirmed that his administration’s legal department is actively reviewing whether the city has legal authority to act on the warrant, particularly given that Netanyahu typically travels to New York each September to address the United Nations General Assembly.

In an earlier interview published Saturday, Mamdani had used even more direct language regarding where he believes Netanyahu should ultimately face justice. “I believe that Prime Minister Netanyahu belongs in The Hague,” Mamdani said at the time.

A position rooted in international law, Mamdani says

In prior public comments, including a Fox News interview with anchor Martha MacCallum, Mamdani has framed his position as grounded in a broader commitment to international law rather than a personal grievance against Netanyahu specifically. “I’ve said that this is a city that believes international law, and this is a city that wants to uplift and uphold those beliefs,” Mamdani told MacCallum, who noted in response that the United States itself does not recognize the ICC’s jurisdiction. Mamdani acknowledged that the U.S. has not signed the treaty establishing the court, but maintained that New York should nonetheless honor the warrant, comparing it to a separate ICC warrant issued for Russian President Vladimir Putin. Mamdani has said he does not intend to create new local laws to facilitate any arrest, but rather to exhaust existing legal options available to the city.

The ICC warrant’s origins

The International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for both Netanyahu and former Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant in November 2024, citing allegations of war crimes and crimes against humanity connected to Israel’s military campaign in Gaza. The ICC, established in 2002 to prosecute genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes, operates under jurisdiction that Israel rejects, and neither Israel nor the United States is a member of the court.

Israel’s response

Israel has firmly rejected both the ICC’s authority and Mamdani’s remarks. In a statement reposted by Netanyahu himself over the weekend, his office described the ICC as “a kangaroo court that has no jurisdiction over Americans or Israelis.” The statement went on to characterize the warrant against Netanyahu as “bogus,” attributing it to what it described as a discredited former ICC prosecutor, Karim Khan, who the statement said issued the warrant shortly before allegations of sexual misconduct against him became public, characterizing the move as an attempt by Khan to divert attention from scrutiny of his own conduct.

Netanyahu’s office also accused Mamdani directly of using the arrest threat to distract from what it characterized as his own failed policies as mayor. The Trump administration has separately imposed sanctions on Khan and roughly a dozen other ICC staff members, in what officials have described as retaliation for the warrants issued against senior Israeli officials over the Gaza war, as well as separate ICC investigations involving U.S. personnel in Afghanistan.

A clash with national implications

Monday’s exchange underscores a broader and increasingly public divide between Mamdani’s administration and the Trump administration over how the United States should engage with the International Criminal Court and its rulings involving allied foreign leaders. With Netanyahu expected to travel to New York in September for the UN General Assembly, as he has in previous years, the dispute over whether the city could or would attempt to act on the ICC warrant is likely to remain a closely watched flashpoint in the coming months.

With Trump having now publicly guaranteed Netanyahu’s safety from arrest while in the United States, and Mamdani continuing to insist that the ICC warrant should be honored under international law, the two leaders’ starkly opposing positions appear likely to remain unresolved heading into the fall, when Netanyahu’s anticipated UN visit could bring the dispute to a more concrete test. For now, both sides have shown no indication of backing away from their respective positions, leaving the question of how, or whether, any attempt to enforce the warrant in New York City might actually unfold as one of the more unusual open legal and political questions facing the incoming mayoral administration.