Oil spill: BP 'may suspend dividend payout'

Board of energy giant to discuss withholding dividend as efforts to cap ruptured well put strain on US-British relations

Thick oil from the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill floats on the surface of the water near Port Sulphur in Louisiana. Photograph: Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty Images

BP could suspend its dividend payout to shareholders over the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, the energy giant has confirmed.

The company said its board would meet on Monday to consider withholding the latest tranche of a £7bn annual payout.

The move comes as David Cameron and Barack Obama prepare to discuss the crisis this afternoon.

A BP spokesman admitted there had been "a lot of political pressure" on the company, and said that suspending the dividend was "an option that's up for discussion".

"No decision has been made on it, we are looking at options," he said.

"There's a board meeting on Monday, but they are not necessarily going to take a decision on it then."

Scientists have said that the amount of oil gushing out of the ruptured well, which bores a mile deep into the seabed, is far higher than previously estimated.

Up to 40,000 barrels a day, over a period of weeks, could have escaped before containment efforts were implemented, the US Geological Survey calculated.

The US president was due to phone Cameron at 4pm (UK time), before taking his fourth trip to the Gulf coast to assess the response to the spill and meet affected residents on Monday and Tuesday, the White House said.

There have been claims that Obama's hard line on BP is jeopardising both its share price and British pensions.

Cameron has been under pressure from senior figures, such as the London mayor, Boris Johnson, to defend BP and stand up to his US counterpart.

Cameron yesterday told the BP chairman, Carl-Henric Svanberg, that it was "in everyone's interests that BP continues to be a financially strong and stable company".

But the prime minister acknowledged Obama's anger, adding that he too was "frustrated and concerned about the environmental damage caused by the leak".

Svanberg has been summoned to the White House for talks with Obama on Wednesday.

The deputy prime minister, Nick Clegg, said yesterday that he would not allow the row to become a "tit-for-tat political diplomatic spat".