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Good morning.

From the newsroom of the Financial Times, today is Wednesday, November 14th, and this is your

FT news briefing.

Today we'll be looking at Italy's defiance of EU spending rules, a record-breaking losing streak for US crude oil, and

calls from Angla Merkel for a unified European army.

Then George Parker will give us the latest on a Brexit deal from the halls of the House of Commons.

I'm Eric Krupky and here's the news you need to start your day.

The midnight EU deadline for Italy's budget came and went last night, but the country remained defiant.

The European Commission had called for Italy to resubmit a budget after rejecting the country's first submission last month.

But Italy's populist coalition government said Rome would stick to its spending plans.

Their budget was rejected because the Commission called it an unprecedented breach of spending rules at a time when its debt is high.

Italy wants to increase welfare spending and reduce the retirement age.

It also plans to lower certain taxes.

Rome now faces potential fines from the Commission starting at 0.2% of Italy's GDP.

Italy's Economy Minister Giovanni Tria wrote a letter to the EU and he said

quote the government considers the current economic and social conditions

particularly unsatisfactory and believes an acceleration of economic growth is necessary.

Technology shares bounced back yesterday, but a prolonged sell-off in oil prices overshadowed that rebound.

Oil prices fell more than 7% yesterday to an 8-month low.

U.S. crude has now been on a losing streak for 12 days.

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