The week's biggest local, national and global stories

The Rundown returns and, for inexplicable reasons, finds a surfeit of stories that revolve around money, a company losing sales, a company possibly bilking its customers of money, prices increasing, people stressing over money, people stealing money and new money making its way into our hands. One place where you can use your money may not be available much longer.

Other opening stories this week:

The federal government is creating an advisory committee to help in appointments such as the governor general.

Pope Benedict joined Twitter this week. Hopefully, his password wasn’t compromised.

More Canadians plan to mark Remembrance Day, a poll says.

A CBC survey of hotel rooms has found high levels of filth and contamination.

Microsoft is dropping Messenger in favour of Skype.

The future of the three elephants at the Toronto Zoo has led to a wider debate about whether elephants should be brought to captivity or left in the wild.

Two notable business leaders exited this week: Frank Stronach resigned from the board at Magna, the auto parts company he founded in 1957, and Robert Dutton stepped down as president and chief executive officer at Rona, a post he held for 20 years.

A forecast by the Bank of Montreal predicts Canadians will spend more this holiday season.

There has not been a Victoria Cross awarded to a Canadian solider for the war in Afghanistan.

A couple of restaurant giants are facing difficult times: McDonald’s sales fell for the first time since 2003 and customer traffic at Tim Hortons has slowed.