Telstra board closer to naming CEO

The board of Telstra Corp, Australia's largest phone company, is likely to confirm its choice of a new chief executive by Friday and announce the decision within weeks, according to The Australian newspaper.

Telstra's board gather in Sydney this week to consider a replacement for ousted chief executive Ziggy Switkowski. The board's recruitment committee has settled on an American, The Australian said, without naming sources.

Separately, The Age newspaper said Macquarie Capital Alliance was a potential buyer of Telstra's directories arm, Sensis, after its bid for Yellow Brick Road, the dominant directories business in the Netherlands, Finland, Austria, the Czech Republic and Slovakia.