Louis Gallois, chief executive of EADS, knows that the stakes are high for the Franco-German aerospace group after the French stock market regulator on Tuesday formally accused it and several senior executives of having violated market rules.

So he wasted no time in writing to the company’s 116,000 staff around the world to urge them to “be patient and support each other” in the face of what could prove to be a long and difficult period as the second phase of the investigation into alleged insider dealing and misleading market information begins.