A worker poses for photographs by holding a copy of Wednesday's Wall Street Journal newspaper above a stand with stacks of other newspapers inside a newsagents at Victoria train station in London, late Wednesday, Oct. 12, 2011. The Guardian newspaper reported Wednesday that it had seen emails and documents showing that The Wall Street Journal funneled money through third parties to a company that was buying up copies of the Journal and boosting its European circulation. (AP Photo/Matt Dunham)
A worker poses for photographs by holding a copy of Wednesday's Wall Street Journal newspaper above a stand with stacks of other newspapers inside a newsagents at Victoria train station in London, late Wednesday, Oct. 12, 2011. The Guardian newspaper reported Wednesday that it had seen emails and documents showing that The Wall Street Journal funneled money through third parties to a company that was buying up copies of the Journal and boosting its European circulation. (AP Photo/Matt Dunham)
A newspaper vendor poses for photographs by holding up a copy of Thursday's Wall Street Journal newspaper on his news stand outside King's Cross train station in London, in the early hours of Thursday, Oct. 13, 2011. The Guardian newspaper reported Wednesday that it had seen emails and documents showing that The Wall Street Journal funneled money through third parties to a company that was buying up copies of the Journal and boosting its European circulation. (AP Photo/Matt Dunham)
The News Corporation building is shown in New York, Wednesday, Oct. 12, 2011. Britain's Guardian newspaper said Wednesday that it had seen emails and documents showing that The Wall Street Journal, a News Corporation publication, funneled money through third parties to boost its European circulation, an explosive charge which could be a further blow to Rupert Murdoch's embattled media empire. (AP Photo/Kathy Willens)
People enter the News Corporation building in New York, Wednesday, Oct. 12, 2011. Britain's Guardian newspaper said Wednesday that it had seen emails and documents showing that The Wall Street Journal, a News Corporation publication, funneled money through third parties to boost its European circulation, an explosive charge which could be a further blow to Rupert Murdoch's embattled media empire. (AP Photo/Kathy Willens)
LONDON (AP) ? Britain's newspaper auditor said Thursday it might investigate The Wall Street Journal's European circulation figures after a report in the Guardian accused it of propping up subscription numbers by effectively buying up its own papers.
The Wall Street Journal Europe's publisher, Andrew Langhoff, has already resigned over the paper's links to a Dutch consulting firm that the Guardian says was receiving payments and getting favorable press in return for buying up thousands of copies of the Journals' papers.
Journal publisher Dow Jones said its deal with the Netherlands-based Executive Learning Partnerships (ELP) had been approved by the Audit Bureau of Circulations, but on Thursday the bureau said "there now appears to be additional new information which may give grounds for further investigation."
The audit bureau is an industry body and does not confirm whether investigations are taking place unless they are completed and result in corrective action.
Dow Jones spokeswoman Bethany Sherman said the company been in communication with the ABC UK since July regarding aspects of the issue and reached out again to the body on Thursday.
"We have always been transparent with the ABC, and they have certified this program over recent reporting periods," she said. "We plan to meet with them soon and review all the details with them again."
When it announced Langhoff's departure on Tuesday, Dow Jones said its links to ELP "could give the impression that news coverage can be influenced by commercial relationships" and that Langhoff resigned because of a "perceived breach of editorial integrity" ? not because of alleged inflation of circulation figures.
While The Wall Street Journal Europe apparently did not deceive advertisers about its circulation, those numbers rested on a foundation of cut-rate deals.
According to the Audit Bureau of Circulations, the report for the first half of this year, just under 14 percent of the daily circulation of Wall Street Journal Europe was sold at full price at newsstands or at the basic annual rate. Some 71 percent of the paper's circulation was sold at 5 percent of the cover price or less, including 26,000 bulk sales mostly to airlines, 13,000 by barter and 7,500 by controlled free circulation.
"Most savvy advertisers would not be deceived" by the newspaper's circulation figure of 74,800 per day, said Bill Nichols, senior lecturer in marketing and communications at Buckingham New University. "I think anybody on the media buying side would be aware that those figures are inflated."
The Journal, quoting what it called people familiar with the matter, said ELP paid 1 euro cent (1.3 U.S. cents) each for 12,000 copies of the paper daily. The paper retails for 1.50 pounds ($2.35, euro1.71) in Europe.
The Guardian, a U.K. newspaper that broke the story Wednesday, says in April last year, Dow Jones sweetened its deal with ELP by offering free ads and "a minimum of three special reports." The Wall Street Journal said stories linked to ELP were published in the European edition on Oct. 14, 2010 and March 14, 2011 as part of the deal.
The Journal confirmed that the promise of editorial content favorable to ELP was made last year when the two companies renegotiated their relationship. The arrangement with ELP, the paper said, was part of a broader program of hosting seminars and other events, and distributing copies of the paper in bulk to universities.
The Journal also said in 2010, Dow Jones arranged a a complex series of deals that channeled "thousands of euros" to ELP through third parties. Dow Jones said it has since ended those arrangements, which it described as legitimate but "admittedly complex." Those deals also hinted of a concerted effort to inflate circulation figures.
The Journal quoted its sources as saying those deals were arranged by Langhoff and a circulation department employee, Gert Van Mol. The Journal quoted Van Mol, whose job was eliminated earlier this year, as saying that he had prompted an internal whistleblowing investigation by filing a complaint about the ELP arrangement.
Dow Jones said the "whistleblower" had been "first investigated by the company because of concerns around his business dealings."
ELP is a business consulting agency that "empowers talent to act into the unknown," according to its website. It also has personnel ties to the paper ? Rien van Lent, an ELP partner, was publisher of The Wall Street Journal Europe from 2001 to 2006.
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Associated Press Writer Cassandra Vinograd contributed to this report.
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