The Serious Fraud Office (SFO) is investigating a massive alleged property investment fraud against several banks that has already cost Allied Irish Banks £56m.

The world's oldest person, Sakhan Dosova, a mother of 10 from Kazakhstan, celebrating her 130th birthday tomorrow, puts her longevity down to her sense of humour. "I don't have any special secret," she says, modestly. "I've never taken pills, and I've never eaten sweets." Sounds simple, doesn't it?

The accountant for Bernard Madoff has become the second person to be charged over Wall Street's biggest swindle. David Friehling faces up to 105 years in jail for criminal fraud, and his family firm, Friehling & Horowitz, also faces civil charges by the US Securities and Exchange Commission.

Bernard Madoff's longtime accountant was arrested on fraud charges today and accused of helping the disgraced money manager cheat thousands of investors out of billions of dollars in the past two decades.

It was all very gallant of Bernard Madoff to try to protect his wife from the US authorities bent on reducing her to penury, but the net is closing in.

A criterion of being a sociopath is composure. Bernard Madoff, jailed last week for the greatest personal financial fraud in history, did not look ghastly and his apology to his former clients carried no explanation. He has borne the waves of hysterical loathing calmly.

Unlike a huge list of others – from Prime Minister Gordon Brown to Haringey social services head Sharon Shoesmith, from disgraced banker Fred Goodwin to child-killer Sean Mercer – Bernard Madoff has at least apologised. "I'm deeply sorry and ashamed for my crimes," he said after pleading guilty to the biggest fraud in history this week. "I am painfully aware that I have hurt many people."

Bernard Madoff pleaded guilty today to charges he orchestrated the biggest financial swindle in Wall Street history, cheating investors out of billions of dollars in a fraud that shocked the public and drew demands for stricter regulations.

Bernard Madoff, accused of masterminding a $50 billion financial fraud, is expected to plead guilty tomorrow to 11 criminal charges that could put him in jail for the rest of his life.

The prospect of yet more pain for hedge funds unsettled Man, the London-based fund group, which traded lower as the London market came off the rally path.