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But much of those will have to be given away to customers unless its rivals cut capacity more aggressively. So, even with the improving outlook, the shares at 700.5p, down 20p, look fully valued on a forward p/e of 19.. Betterware’s management has worked hard to restore the catalogue retailing group’s fragile reputation since 1993 when sentiment was hammered by ill-timed share sales by the controlling Cohen family. The shares have bounced from the low of 38.5p hit two years ago, but even after a 7.5p rise to 119.5p yesterday, the recovery seems to have petered out over the past 12 months. There is clearly plenty for the City to remain nervous about.

The reputation of Andrew Cohen, chief executive, took a knock after the share sales. With 46 per cent of the shares, his family is again set to be the chief beneficiary of the pounds 9.8m to be paid out under the new special dividend proposals announced yesterday. Even coming so close to the possible election of a Labour government, Mr Cohen probably deserves the benefit of the doubt, given that the possibility of a special payment was mooted six months ago.
More pertinent is the underlying trading picture at Betterware, which yesterday reported a 24 per cent jump in pre-tax profits to pounds 11.5m for the year to 1 March. The figures are complicated by losses in the previous year on the former plastic moulding business and another VAT repayment, which garnered pounds 1.25m in 1996/97.But at the sales level, the company insists a slowdown in second-half growth in the UK from 16 per cent in the previous period to just 7 per cent last year is not to be taken as evidence of a maturing market. It remains confident it can achieve “high single-figure” growth over the next few years.Even so, the real excitement must come from abroad. Europe could chip in pounds 1m to profits this year, while the Latin American joint venture with Avon, which moves into Brazil next month, could be contributing at least that much by 1998/99. Flat profits of pounds 11.5m in the current year would put the shares on a forward p/e of 16 High enough..

Trinity Holdings, the specialist maker and exporter of buses, fire engines, dust carts and the like, says it has yet to be hit by the strength of sterling, despite 43 per cent of its sales going abroad. Exports soared 38 per cent in the year, helping total turnover to rise 26 per cent to pounds 262m. The rather slower growth in profit, up just 9 per cent to pounds 17.4m, was blamed more on temporary difficulties within export markets themselves. Those affected bus body kit maker Duple Metsec and UMW-Dennis, the joint venture company in Malaysia.

After allowing for the new shares issued to fund the acquisition of Douglas & Schopf in January last year, earnings per share were static at 20.6p.
But cash flow remains strong – the company had pounds 8.2m in the bank at the end of the year – and the current order book is also at record levels. Trinity is market leader in the UK bus, fire engine and refuse-collection markets and after combining Douglas & Schopf with Reliance Mercury, has now added leadership in airport and dock-handling equipment.Although capacity at Dennis Specialist Vehicles was increased by 30 per cent in 1995, demand for buses and coaches was so strong that a further increase in assembly facilities is needed this year. DSV has 41 per cent of the bus market and 15 per cent of the coach market in the UK.Growth in the domestic coach market levelled off last year, but pounds 70m worth of orders from Hong Kong provides a sizeable cushion. Cuts in fire service budgets reduced demand 30 per cent below normal levels last year, although there are signs of a recovery in 1997.The shares fell 3.5p to 315p, putting them on a forward p/e of 14, if profit forecasts of pounds 19.5m for this year are borne out. The continuing strength of sterling is the main obvious threat, but assuming it eases the shares still look good value.. The tussle for Terminal 5 went public yesterday after Richard Branson, chairman of Virgin Atlantic Airways, attacked the decision to hand over the proposed pounds 1.2bn development at Heathrow Airport to British Airways. BAA, which runs Heathrow, ruled that Terminal 5 – which is still the subject of a marathon public inquiry – would be used solely by BA and its alliance partners if and when it was built.
Mr Branson, who is leading the fight to stop BA’s plans to link up with American Airlines, the carrier with the largest turnover in the world, said the move would give BA an unfair advantage over other airlines.”One has to ask whether this is a fair opportunity for customers to give a brand, spanking new facility to a monopolistic airline when all the carriers are paying for it,” said Mr Branson, who intends to take the matter up with the Office for Fair Trading and the European Commission.BAA says that its annual pounds 1.6bn revenue stream comes from three principal sources.