Current Account spoke briefly to an Irish fund manager who still has some Smurfit shares about the group's decision to produce quarterly financial reports from next year. The fund manager was far from enthusiastic about this prospect: "The same old excuses four times a year instead of twice a year," was his response.

Now Current Account has mixed feelings about this move by Smurfit. On one hand, one is always enthusiastic about shareholders getting as much information as possible - and the current situation where Irish companies only report twice a year is less than perfect.

On the other hand, if quarterly reports from Smurfit repeat the same old mantras about cyclical industry upswings and downturns, blah, blah, that we have had to bear for the past few years - then it's hard not to empathise with the view of our fund manager friend.

US funds now own more than half of Smurfit's shares compared to just 15 per cent in 1995. Predictably, Michael Smurfit sees that growth in the US shareholding as a vote of confidence in Smurfit and presumably his own stewardship of the group - over a period when Smurfit shares have gone absolutely nowhere except sideways.

Factor in inflation, and money invested in Smurfit shares in October 1995 has lost value.

So, is a higher level of US shareholding a badge of distinction for Smurfit and are the US investors who have bought into the stock in such numbers somehow more knowledgeable than their Irish counterparts, who have dumped the stock in huge amounts in the past few years?

If one agrees with the argument that the US packaging industry is just around the corner from a recovery, then maybe the US investors are a canny bunch who have seen the light. But there have been so many false dawns for Smurfit that it is difficult not to reach the conclusion that Irish fund managers who took their money out of Smurfit shares and put it into euro-zone stocks have made the cannier decision.

Lest this is seen as an exercise in bashing American investors, let it be noted that the same institutions who have bought the Smurfit argument have also bought the eminently more plausible (and rewarding) arguments from the likes of CRH, Elan, Ryanair, IAWS and, to a lesser extent, the banks, and have done very nicely.

Michael Smurfit's decision to adopt US financial reporting standards will inevitably renew speculation on a merger between Smurfit and its 29.5 per cent-owned Smurfit Stone (SSCC) associate, where former Smurfit chief operating officer Ray Curran is top dog.

Ever since the merger of its US subsidiary JS Corp with Stone, there has been speculation on an eventual merger between Stone and Smurfit itself. The increasing Americanisation of Jefferson Smurfit will no doubt reinvigorate that speculation, although talk across the Atlantic is that SSCC is not in any mad rush to merge.

Incidentally, SSCC's current market capitalisation is $3.3 billion (€3.7 billion), while Smurfit's market capitalisation is €2.3 billion. Strip out the value of Smurfit's 29.5 per cent stake in SSCC - €1.09 billion - and the market is valuing all Smurfit's European and Latin American interests at just €1.2 billion!