Hillary Clinton is to be nominated as secretary of state next week, according to Barack Obama's aides.

The president-elect plans to announce the move after next Thursday's Thanksgiving holiday, the unnamed aides told Associated Press.

They said complex vetting procedures had been resolved after Clinton's husband and former president, Bill, handed over information about all the donors to his foundation, which operates in more than 40 countries.

Clinton's aides refused to comment. She was reported to be planning to accept the role earlier this week.

But today's New York Times quoted Clinton's friends as saying she was wavering between accepting the role or taking on an enhanced role in the Senate. Clinton would have to surrender her Senate seat, which she has held for eight years, to take the job.

Some fellow Democrats and government insiders have questioned whether Clinton is too independent and politically ambitious to be an effective secretary of state.

But a senior Obama adviser said the president-elect has been enthusiastic about naming Clinton as his top diplomat, believing she would bring instant stature and credibility to US foreign relations.

The aides said Obama and Clinton had had substantive conversations about the secretary of state job. They met in Chicago last week at Obama's transition team headquarters.

Obama is likely to choose the Arizona governor, Janet Napolitano, to be secretary of homeland security, top Obama advisers and several Democrats said yesterday.

So far, Obama has informally selected the Washington lawyer Eric Holder as attorney general and the former Senate majority leader Tom Daschle as health secretary. But the plans could be sidetracked by unexpected glitches in the final vetting process, officials cautioned.

Other possible posts include the retention of the defence secretary, Robert Gates. Aides say he would stay temporarily and later give way to the former navy secretary Richard Danzig.

But the Republican senator Chuck Hagel and Democratic senator Jack Reed are also said to be under consideration.

Democrats also say that several people remain in the running for treasury secretary, including Timothy Geithner, the president of Federal Reserve Bank of New York; Lawrence Summers, the former treasury secretary; and the former Federal Reserve chairman Paul Volcker.