The 10 biggest stories on Wednesday October 28

Barclays confirms Jes Staley as new boss; Twitter shares crashed in after-hours trading in the US; Lloyds PPI mis-selling charges total £14 billion.

Many users were affected after the social network succumbed to one of its trademark outages (Bethany Clarke/Getty Images)

1. The US Federal Reserve's latest monetary policy announcement is due at 6 pm on Wednesday.

2. Barclays has officially confirmed that its new chief executive will be Jes Staley in an announcement this morning. He will take up the role from 1 December.

3. BT Group's purchase of mobile phone network EE has been provisionally cleared by the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA). BT announced it was buying EE for £12.5 billion in February this year.

4. Lloyds' final bill for the PPI mis-selling scandal has come in at £13.9 billion – more than twice the amount put aside by any other bank.

5. Pharmacy giant Walgreens Boots Alliance, which owns Boots in the UK, has announced plans to buy rival chain Rite Aid for $9 (£5.88) per share. That values Rite Aid at $9.4 billion (£6.1 billion). The deal is worth $17.2 billion (£11.2 billion).

6. Swiss bank Credit Suisse has hired five bankers from Barclays in expectation of another busy year for health care deals. All five are expected to start by the first quarter of 2016, according to a statement from Credit Suisse.

7. Fashion chain Next grew sales 5.9 per cent in the 13 weeks to 28 October, while its directory division grew by 6.2 per cent, giving the group as a whole a six per cent increase in sales. Year to date, turnover is up 4.4 per cent. The company has increased its group profit expectations to between £810 million and £845 million, up 3.6 per cent and 8 per cent on last year.

8. Twitter shares crashed in after-hours trading in the US after the company reported another quarter of disappointing user growth and a weak revenue forecast for the last three months of the year. The microblogging site reported 320 million monthly active users, versus the 324 million expected by analysts, and compared to 316 million users in the second quarter.

9. Apple has reported a jump in sales in the three months to September, driven by sales of its iPhone. The company sold more than 48 million iPhones in the period – a record fourth quarter sales. The tech giant's revenue was $51.5 billionn (£33.6 billion), up 22 per cent compared with the same period last year.

10. UK ranks as sixth-most business friendly country in the world in World Bank Group's Doing Business report