The Cboe volatility index — known as Wall Street’s “fear gauge” — jumped to its highest level since the “flash crash” of August 2011, reflecting the heightened volatility in US stocks at a time of growing concerns over the coronavirus outbreak.

Baidu, China’s dominant search engine, tripled its profit in the fourth quarter but forecast weaker revenues for the first three months of this year, as analysts look ahead to the potential damage to its business from the coronavirus that has stalled the world’s second-largest economy.

Wall Street’s benchmark stock index notched its quickest correction since the Great Depression as concerns about the impact of the coronavirus on economic growth grip global markets.

US stocks fell more than 4 per cent on Thursday, extending a sell-off to its sixth day and closing in correction territory, as pressure grew on the Federal Reserve and other central banks to cut rates in response to the coronavirus.

Netflix, Clorox and Gilead Sciences are among the mere handful of winners in the S&P 500 during a market rout this week, as investors back companies most likely to weather economic fallout from a potential pandemic.

US agritech start-up Indigo Ag is cutting 150 jobs and closing its operations in Australia as it realigns its operations on fast growing areas of its business.

Pemex, Mexico’s state energy company, virtually doubled its 2019 loss and failed to meet its production target despite hailing a turnround in its fortunes, as it battles to stave off a widely expected second downgrade of its debt to junk status in the coming months.

Anglo American has welcomed moves by the South African government to ease tough currency control rules that have prevented the company from accessing cash and weighed on its share price.

US companies will post no earnings growth this year as the coronavirus outbreak becomes widespread, Goldman Sachs warned, as fears over the economic fallout from the epidemic have intensified.

Steven Seagal, the straight-to-video action movie star, has been fined $314,000 for allegedly touting a cryptocurrency without disclosing payments he received for the work.

Underlying measures of business investment in the US looked to be in solid shape at the start of the year, bouncing back from declines at the end of 2019, but economists are questioning how long a recovery might last in the face of the coronavirus outbreak.

The outgoing head of the world’s largest sovereign wealth fund said Norway had moved from being “an oil nation to an oil fund nation” as he unveiled the $1.1tn fund’s second-best annual performance. 

Zalando has unveiled an ambitious push into the €38bn luxury clothing segment, with a promise to double the assortment from premium makers such as Moschino and Alberta Ferreti on its website by 2023.

Drax, the FTSE 250 power company, is to stop using coal in 2022, ahead of the UK’s 2025 deadline, as it seeks to become a leading carbon-negative energy business through the use of biomass fuel.

Aston Martin’s losses deepened to more than £100m in 2019, the group said on Thursday, as it announced plans to part ways with its finance chief following a turbulent year which culminated in a £500m rescue deal last month.

Bayer’s legal woes in the US have deepened, with the German chemicals and pharmaceuticals group disclosing on Thursday that it faces claims from 48,600 plaintiffs alleging that its Roundup weedkiller causes cancer.

Housebuilder Persimmon announced the resignation of its chief executive after just over a year in the job following a report criticising the quality of the company’s homes and a wave of customer complaints.

Wall Street extended its losses on Wednesday in a volatile day for global markets as traders responded to new cases of the coronavirus in Europe and Asia.

Microsoft has warned it will miss its revenue guidance for its Windows and Surface businesses, blaming uncertainty around the coronavirus.

Only two months into 2020 and Mexico’s central bank has already cut its growth forecast for this year.

Sales of newly built homes in the US accelerated last month to their strongest pace in more than 12 years, a bright sign for a housing market bolstered by low interest rates.

Lloyds Banking Group and insurance group Direct Line each announced hundreds of job cuts on Wednesday as they moved to lower costs as more customers embraced digital services.

William Hill, the UK bookmaker, almost wiped out its losses from last year after shrinking its shop estate following the implementation of punitive regulations on betting machines in the UK.

Russia’s Norilsk Nickel, the world’s largest producer of palladium, says carmakers won’t switch away from the metal in catalytic converters despite a record 80 per cent surge in prices over the past year.

BP will cut ties with three US industry lobby groups over disagreements with their climate policies.