Or to be more accurate in the eyes of its industrial partners

Or, to be more accurate, in the eyes of its industrial partners. Thus Airbus made a bottom-line loss of pounds 120m last year according to British Aerospace, but an underlying profit of up to pounds 450m if you believe Aerospatiale of France. For what it is worth, the figure they use down at Airbus headquarters in Toulouse is a pounds 40m operating profit.
Noel Forgeard, who took over as chief executive of this peculiar beast a year ago, has sensibly decided that much of the profit Airbus has been booking for the past three years is as fictional as the finest work of Victor Hugo, and has begun to bring private sector conventions to bear.Thus were the Airbus accounts for 1998 ever to see the light of day, they would show a pounds 200m provision to cover exposure to unprofitable aircraft sales over the previous three years when the vicious price war with Boeing was at its height. Whether Airbus really makes money or loses it is, like beauty, in the eye of the beholder. AIRBUS INDUSTRIE does not publish its own accounts – one of the joys of being part of that strange French hybrid known as a Groupement D’Interets Economique, or GIE. Even when financial information about the business does seep out into the public domain, it is only after liberal use of that old accounting double act, smoke and mirrors.

In a recent speech, Alan Greenspan, chairman of the Federal Reserve, wondered out loud whether the Fed had not over-reacted in cutting interest rates as far as it did in response to the financial turmoil of the autumn.So far, however, the American economy shows little sign of giving him an excuse to raise them again Inflation remains stoically in abeyance. Foreigners are prepared to keep pouring capital into the US not just because of the lack of alternatives, but also because American business for the time being seems to offer the best chance of innovation, advancement and growth.The US economy cannot keep growing indefinitely at the present heady pace without a resurgence in price pressures. Increasingly, however, they become like Tony Dye at Phillips & Drew; the scale of the correction now needed to vindicate their underweight positions in US equities has become so horrendous that it would take an economic calamity of monumental proportions to bring it about.At this juncture that hardly looks likely, despite the growing size of the US trade deficit and the risk that foreign investors will not be prepared to finance it for very much longer. In recent months many have taken to depicting Wall Street as one of the biggest financial bubbles of all time Plainly the Americans don’t believe it. Readers will know that we haven’t been exactly immune to the bubble theory ourselves, but we somewhat belatedly changed our minds when we saw action from the Federal Reserve to quell the turmoil in financial markets last autumn, and the subsequent strength of the recovery in equity markets.
There are still good reasons for caution, and the bears must be right in insisting that eventually there will be a correction. The rise in Terranova’s share price to 135.5p means Unigate must go higher.Analysts reckon that around 150p would win the day, which would certainly suit Phillips & Drew, which was buying the stock heavily at around 90p as recently as January. For it to get more exciting than this would take a rival bidder to emerge So far, Tomkins is the only name in the frame..

THE DOW through 10,000 is such a milestone that it seems worth returning to Wall Street’s soaraway bull market, even though this column attempted to pass judgement on it only last week. Add to this the target’s M&S sandwich supply business, and it looks a very tasty morsel.It won’t win the prize at this price, though. Unigate had a go at an agreed deal at the weekend, but was rejected Now it is a case of third time lucky. Or so it hopes.What all this proves is that Unigate is as keen as mustard to buy this business.