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British police searched the offices of Rupert Murdoch’s British newspapers Saturday after arresting a police officer and four current and former staff of his tabloid The Sun as part of an investigation into police bribery by journalists.

The arrests spread the scandal over tabloid wrongdoing _ which has already caused the closure of one tabloid, the News of the World _ to a second Murdoch newspaper.

London’s Metropolitan Police said two men aged 48 and one aged 56 were arrested on suspicion of corruption early in the morning at homes in and around London. A 42-year-old man was detained later at a London police station.

Murdoch’s News Corp. confirmed that all four were current or former Sun employees.

A fifth man, a 29-year-old police officer, was arrested at the London station where he works.

The investigation into whether reporters illegally paid police for information is running parallel to a police inquiry into phone hacking by Murdoch’s now-defunct News of the World.

Officers were searching the men’s homes and the east London headquarters of the media mogul’s British newspapers for evidence.

Police said Saturday’s arrests were made as a result of information provided by the Management and Standards Committee of Murdoch’s News Corp.

News Corp. said it was cooperating with police.

“News Corporation made a commitment last summer that unacceptable news gathering practices by individuals in the past would not be repeated,” it said in a statement.

A dozen people have now been arrested in the bribery probe, though none has yet been charged.

They include former Rebekah Brooks, former chief executive of Murdoch’s News International, ex-News of the World editor Andy Coulson _ who is also Prime Minister David Cameron’s former communications chief _ and journalists from the News of the World and The Sun.

Two of the London police force’s top officers resigned in the wake of the revelation last July that the News of the World had eavesdropped on the cell phone voicemail messages of celebrities, athletes, politicians and even an abducted teenager in its quest for stories.

Murdoch shut down the 168-year-old tabloid, and the scandal has triggered a continuing public inquiry into media ethics and the relationship between the press, police and politicians.

An earlier police investigation failed to find evidence hacking went beyond one reporter and a private investigator, but News Corp. has now acknowledged it was much more widespread.

Last week the company agreed to pay damages to 37 hacking victims, including actor Jude Law, soccer star Ashley Cole and British politician John Prescott.

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Things are looking up in Europe, at least for now, as borrowing costs in Italy and Spain eased Thursday following strong debt auctions.

Spain’s auction of nearly €10 billion worth of bonds in three different maturities met with strong demand, as did Italy’s €8.5 billion of 12-month bills.

The European Central Bank was "supplying quite a bit of liquidity" by buying an undisclosed amount of bonds to prop up the market, as it typically does, said Frances Hudson, global thematic strategist for Standard Life Investments in Edinburgh, Scotland.

But the auctions were also driven by newfound confidence in the new leadership of the Spanish and Italian governments, she added. "You go into a halo effect because you’ve got a new government so people are willing to give them the benefit of the doubt."

German and Italy sound upbeat on debt crisis

David Rodriguez, quantitative strategist at DailyFX, noted that Spain wound up selling nearly twice the amount it had planned on auctioning, which signals real market demand for bonds, not just support from the ECB.

"Maybe the ECB stepped in, but the ECB wouldn’t have the firepower to put €5 billion into that auction," he said. "I think what investors are seeing is the probability that these nations will remain solvent for the foreseeable future."

The healthy demand for Italian and Spanish bonds helped to drive up European stocks. London’s FTSE () closed higher by 1.2%, the DAX () in Frankfurt rose 2 no teletrack payday loan.5% and the CAC 40 () in Paris jumped 2.3%.

The auction results also helped to drive down bond yields. The average yield for the Italian 10-year bond slipped to 6.63%, remaining below the anxiety benchmark of 7%, and the average yield for the 10-year Spanish bond dropped to 5.13%.

But Hudson cautioned against extrapolating too much from the Italian bond auction and its impact on the 10-year bond yields, since it was for bills, not bonds. Also, she said she wasn’t sure how long the renewed confidence would last.

Don’t get too comfortable with European bonds, urged Marc Chandler, strategist at Brown Brothers Harriman, noting that more auctions lie ahead.

The euro’s fatal problem isnt’ spending

"Risk lies with the bond sale tomorrow, especially with the large increase in Italian bond prices today as the 5-year yield is off 60 [basis points] and the 10-year yield has dropped about 40 [basis points]," wrote Chandler, in a market report. "The year is long, and the amount that the sovereigns and banks need to raise is large."

The euro also got a modest boost Thursday, edging to $1.28 against the U.S. dollar, after hitting an 18-month low of $1.26 on Wednesday.

"At least on the short end of the curve, you see a little bit of confidence returning to the market," said Rodriguez, referring to the euro and European bonds. 

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St. Louis Place, a 20-story office building in downtown St. Louis, is facing foreclosure after its owner apparently was unable to renegotiate its real estate loan with U.S. Bank.

The building, at 200 North Broadway, is nearly 90 percent full. The primary occupant is the headquarters of Fleishman-Hillard, the public relations firm with offices worldwide.

A foreclosure sale is scheduled for Jan. 27.

Records show that Behringer Harvard, a Dallas-based real estate investment trust, and affiliates paid Trizec Properties $30.15 million for St. Louis Place in 2004. The red brick building, designed by the Peckman Guyton Albers & Viets architecture firm and completed in 1983, is distinctive for balconies set beneath a large overhang spanning the middle floors.

A Behringer Harvard official was unavailable for comment Monday. A lawyer for U.S. Bank declined to comment.

In a report to the Securities and Exchange Commission in November, Behringer Harvard said its St. Louis Place property manager and asset manager was in talks with the lender to restructure the loan No teletrack payday loans. The report said there was “no assurance that this loan will be restructured,” adding that foreclosure or surrendering the building to the lender was possible.

Also in November, U.S. Bank went to court to get a receiver appointed to take over the building’s operation.

On Thursday, St. Louis Circuit Judge Mark Neill appointed Cassidy Turley, a commercial real estate firm, to manage St. Louis Place.

Lingering weakness in the downtown property market has put pressure on building owners to maintain occupancy and lease rates while trying to pay off large real estate loans.

At least one big downtown company has decided to stay put and buy its leased space instead of building a new headquarters. In August, Stifel Finacial Corp. said it would buy its headquarters at 501 North Broadway instead of investing in a new headquarters at Ballpark Village.

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Yemeni soldiers battled al-Qaida-linked militants Monday outside the southern city of Zinjibar, which remains partly under the control of the Islamists. Five soldiers and four fighters were killed, a military official said.

The intense fighting in northern and eastern Zinjibar included artillery and rocket shelling on militant hideouts, the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity in line with military regulations.

He said the military units were engaged in pitched battles with armed gangs deployed on the streets, and have advanced on areas controlled by the militants.

At least 60 people, including 23 soldiers, have been killed in the fighting since last week.

Islamic militants, including some with links to the al-Qaida branch in Yemen, seized control of Zinjibar and another town in April and May. They were taking advantage of the turmoil surrounding the popular uprising against President Ali Abdullah Saleh to expand their area of operations.

Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula was behind several nearly successful attempts to attack U.S. targets, including the failed attempt to down a passenger jet bound for Detroit on Christmas Day 2009. Washington believes it is the most dangerous of several al-Qaida’s offshoots around the globe.

President Saleh has cooperated with the U.S. in fighting the group and used the threat of al-Qaida in arguing that he could not relinquish power in Yemen despite the protests calling for him to go since February payday loans.

The U.S. withdrew its support of Saleh in the summer, and the autocratic leader signed a deal last month to transfer power in exchange for immunity from prosecution over the deaths of protesters and corruption during his 33 years in power.

The deal has failed to quell the protests in Yemen, which have recently expanded to include labor strikes, calling for Saleh loyalists to be removed from office and for Saleh to be put on trial.

On Monday, Yemen’s military agreed to replace a commander accused of corruption, apparently settling a brief strike by 1,000 soldiers, said Anwar Abdullah, an officer in a military department that deals with public affairs and army morale. Abdullah said that the strikers demanded the ouster of department head Maj. Gen. Ali al-Shater for mismanagement, accusing him of running his own prison, in which some soldiers were jailed even for minor offenses. Some were kept in chains.

Abdullah said after the prime minister intervened in the dispute Monday, it was agreed that al-Shater would be replaced.

The soldiers said they would end their strike when the defense minister appoints a new commander.

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New polymer banknotes demand that all money-handling machines in the country be upgraded at a cost of $75-100 million, the Bank of Canada estimates.

That compares to $20-30 million for the last conversion in 2004-2006, bank spokesperson Julie Girard said Tuesday.

“This transition is going to be a little more involved,” she said in a phone interview.

The new $100 bill came into circulation last month, made of a smooth, film-like polymer material and incorporating such high-tech security features as the world’s first transparent windows with embedded metallic pictures.

The $50 bill goes into circulation in March, the $20 bill late next year, the $10 and $5 in 2013.

Although the currency size remains unchanged, the texture, security enhancements and relative lightness of the new bills necessitate machinery upgrades.

“In Canada, we have 500,000 machines that accept, dispense or sort bank notes,” Girard said. “They include ATMs, parking machines, and sorting machines that banks and financial institutions use — the full gamut.”

Automated Teller Machines, or ATMs, number 75,000 alone, she said.

They don’t usually dispense $100 bills. Nor do automated parking wickets, TTC token dispensers or change-making machines.

So far, the mechanisms affected mainly include institutional ones that count and sort $100 notes. But in the coming months, other money-machine owners will have to adjust, modify, convert or replace their equipment.

“We’ve been working (on this) for more than two years,” Girard said. “People from our regional offices go out every single day to retailers, financial institutions, law-enforcement officers.

“They do presentations at public libraries,” she said. “They talk to the blind and the visually impaired. You can insert these bills in a banknote reader and it will read out what the denomination is.”

While upgrade costs might appear steep, the polymer bills generate savings in other areas, Girard said.

Staying with the familiar cotton-paper blend to execute the high-security features would have cost $200 million more than by using polymer, the bank estimates.

Being more durable, the new bills are expected to last two-and-a-half times longer than existing ones — at least seven years.

That means savings on production costs as well as on costs to transport replacement bills across the country, especially as the new bills are 10 per cent lighter than the old ones, Girard said.

Thwarting counterfeiters also implies savings for police and courts, the bank says.

The showcase security feature — a world first — is the large see-through window running vertically toward the right on the face side, next to the portrait of former prime minister Sir Robert Borden on the $100 bill.

A smaller, metallic portrait of Sir Robert and a metallic picture of the Parliament buildings embedded in the window can be seen equally from the face and reverse sides of the bill.

The metallic Sir Robert reflects rainbow colours when tipped in the light. The metallic Parliament, created using different technology, does not reflect light in the same way.

About 30 other countries issue polymer currency, Girard said. Some also have a window, but not as large a window as the Canadian one and the metallic pictures count as a world first.

Sooner or later, counterfeiters are expected to catch up to the bank’s technologists. The new series is given a lifespan of eight years, when machine upgrades must begin again.

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Ryerson University plans to make a major announcement Tuesday about its fundraising efforts for the Maple Leaf Gardens, leading to speculation the school may be about to reveal the title sponsor for the venue.

The school, which is a part-owner of the iconic structure, set a goal of raising $60 million to install badly needed student athletic facilities in part of the former hockey arena.

The $60 million is to be raised in equal portions by a federal government infrastructure grant, a special levy on Ryerson students, and corporate donations from such firm as Gardens

A top U.S. tech analyst is predicting Amazon is likely to launch its own under-$200 smartphone by next year.

And Amazon could sell the device for $170 U.S. or less, said Citigroup analyst Mark Mahaney.

It would be the second head-on Amazon assault on Apple, right after the launch of the iPad tablet competitor Kindle Fire in the United States.

Mahaney based his prediction

Banks are dragging the stock market lower as worries resurface about the European debt crisis and the broker MF Global.

The Dow Jones industrial average is down 125 points, or 1.1 percent, at 12,101 shortly after the opening bell Monday.

The S&P 500 is down 17, or 1.2 percent, at 1,268. The Nasdaq is down 38, or 1.4 percent, at 2,700.

The decline comes after the Dow closed out its fifth straight week of gains, its best winning streak since January.

Bank stocks dropped sharply in early trading after the New York Federal Reserve suspended MF Global Holdings from conducting new business as a Treasury bond dealer.

Trading in MF Global stock was halted. Bank of America Corp. and Citigroup Inc. were down more than 3 percent.

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Banks are parking more money overnight with the European Central Bank in a sign the eurozone debt crisis is unsettling the banking system.

Banks deposited euro255.6 billion ($347.1 billion) overnight Friday, the highest this year, the central bank said on Monday. That surpassed the previous year high of euro229 billion from Thursday.

The deposits suggest banks would rather stash money with the ECB than lend it to each other. Banks are afraid that other banks could suffer losses on Greek and other government bonds in case of a default _ and not pay them back.

The increase follows a worsening of fears about a Europe-wide banking crisis and credit crunch that could hurt global economic growth.

The governments of Belgium, France and Luxembourg have had to come to the rescue of Dexia, a bank that had trouble borrowing on the interbank credit market because it is heavily exposed to Greek and Italian bonds.

The Belgian government is stepping in to buy Dexia’s retail operations there as part of a wider bailout that will see the three governments provide euro90 billion in funding guarantees.

Eurozone political leaders are working on plans to put more capital into banks across Europe to better shield them from the government debt crisis. German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy said Sunday night that they expected to come up with a plan by the end of the month but offered no details.

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