Business Live: Oil's slide continues

Wall Street's morning bounce has all but disappeared.

The Dow Jones ended 0.35% higher at 23,675.5, while the S&P 500 just about eked out a gain, adding 0.01% to 2,546.15. The Nasdaq ended 0.45% higher at 6,783.91.

The direction of travel for Wednesday will be determined by the US Federal Reserve which is widely expected to raise interest rates by 0.25% tomorrow.

Steven FerdmanCopyright: Steven Ferdman

Investors have been warned to prepare for the worst by former Federal Reserve chair Alan Greenspan.

The economist, who led the bank from 1987 to 2006, has told CNN that he doesn't expect stock prices to go any higher than they are currently.

"It would be very surprising to see it sort of stabilise here, and then take off," he said.

If they do go up then investors should prepare for a rapid correction, he warned.

"At the end of that run, run for cover."

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Barclays has been fined $15m (£12m) by a US regulator over attempts by chief executive Jes Staley and senior management to unmask a whistleblower.

The New York state department of financial services said its investigation found “shortcomings in governance, controls and corporate culture relating to Barclays’ whistleblowing function”.

Mr Staley himself was fined £642,430 by regulators earlier this year for breaching rules by trying to identify the whistleblower.

AFPCopyright: AFP

Of course, Donald Trump isn't going to Davos alone.

Treasury secretary Steven Mnuchin will lead the delegation which includes Mike Pompeo, Secretary of State and Wilbur Ross, Secretary of Commerce as well as Robert Lighthizer, United States Trade Representative.

Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner will also be there.

BBCCopyright: BBC

The oil price has continued to slide, losing ground for the third day in a row.

US crude lost over 7%, eventually settling at $46.24 a barrel, its weakest level since August 2017.

Meanwhile, Brent lost 5.6% to settle at $56.26 a barrel.

Analysts are blaming ongoing fears over oversupply - particularly in the US - for the falls.

Oil cartel Opec and other oil producers agreed earlier this month to curb production by 1.2 million barrels per day, equivalent to more than 1% of global demand.

But the cuts will not happen until next month and production has been at or near record highs in the US, Russia and Saudi Arabia.

AFP/GettyCopyright: AFP/Getty

Donald Trump is headed back to Davos, his spokeswoman has announced.

When he attended the annual gathering of economic bigwigs last year, it was the first visit by a sitting president in almost two decades.

His return suggests Mr Trump has developed a taste for the ritzy Swiss ski town, which hosts the World Economic Forum's annual meeting.

That's a somewhat ironic turn of events, given that his former campaign advisor Stephen Bannon had used the phrase "party of Davos" as shorthand for a despised economic elite.

The forum's global outlook is also seen as at odds with President Trump's nationalist trade policies.

SpaceXCopyright: SpaceX

Elon Musk's rocket company SpaceX is set to raise $500m from existing shareholders and new investor Baillie Gifford & Co, according to the Wall Street Journal.

The new investment values the firm at a whopping $30.5bn.

The company plans to invest the funds in the company's satellite internet service, Starlink, the newspaper said.

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US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin says he'd be happy to stay in his job if Donald Trump is elected for a second term.

In an interview with Bloomberg, he said: "I foresee myself here at least through the first term and if the president wants me here for a second term when he’s re-elected, I would seriously entertain that.”

Italy has finally struck a deal with the European Commission over its contested 2019 budget, according to a spokeswoman for the Economy Ministry.

The EC had rejected Italy'sdraft budget in October, stating it was in clear breach of EU fiscal rules.

The country put in a revised plan last week with a lower deficit.

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As accountancy firms digest wide-reaching proposals to shake-up the audit market, it looks like the race may soon be on to win a plum client.

Sky News is reporting that Vodafone is preparing to drop PwC as its auditor because of legal row over Phones4U, the retailer that collapsed in 2014.

PwC is the administrator to Phones4U and Sky News says there is a persistent threat of litigation because Vodafone and other mobile networks cancelled their distribution contracts with the retailer.

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Women must wait 202 years before they can earn the same as men and have equal job opportunities, according to a global report released earlier today.

The World Economic Forum says worldwide women earn around half as much men.

Even in the UK there is still "a very significant wage gap" and "still a significant gap in senior roles", report co-author Saadia Zahidi, head of WEF's Centre for the New Economy and Society, tells the BBC.

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Facebook's chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg has admitted in a blog post that the firm has to do more to curb misinformation after research revealed that Russia-backed firms targeted African-Americans, who favoured Hillary Clinton, to suppress voter turnout during the 2016 election.

"We know that we need to do more: to listen, look deeper and take action to respect fundamental rights," Ms Sandberg wrote.

US intelligence agencies had earlier concluded that Russia interfered in the election to help President Donald Trump by undermining Democratic candidate Clinton.

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Saudi Arabia's king has unveiled the kingdom's budget for next year, which local media are saying is the largest in the oil-rich country's history.

"We are determined to move along the path of economic reform," the king said.

He said that the country's spending was projected to rise to 1.106 trillion riyals ($295bn; £233bn) next year - an increase of 7%.

According to English-language Arab News, the budget increase is an effort "to boost economic growth, hurt by low oil prices that have plummeted more than 30% since October". "

PACopyright: PA

Royal Bank of Scotland has appointed Katie Murray as chief financial officer, making permanent a role she has held on an interim basis since August.

Ms Murray will become the first woman to hold the finance chief post at RBS when she takes up the job at the start of the year.

The FTSE 100 has closed over 1.1% lower at 6,701.59. That's the blue-chip index's lowest close for two years, since November 2016.

The FTSE 250, however, has managed a positive close, ending 0.5% higher at 17,495.04.