Carlos Ghosn would like to see Renault and Nissan take stakes in General Motors as part of a potential three-way alliance among the carmakers. Ideally he would like GM to take a shareholding in the French and Japanese manufacturers he heads.

Mr Ghosn said that equity stakes were an open subject with the GM talks focused on the benefits and risks of any deal. But he said alliances worked best when, as with Renault and Nissan, they involved shareholdings.

"Agreements without shareholdings are usually temporary and short-lived," he said. "You don't go to the depth of the synergies because you have always the suspicion that this is going to end at a certain point."

Mr Ghosn's comments are the most explicit yet on his plans to invest in a GM alliance, a proposal being jointly evaluated by teams from the three companies. He had previously tried to calm investors worried about Nissan and Renault investing in GM by saying a shareholding was not a precondition for a deal, a position he repeated.

Mr Ghosn said it would be preferable for GM to invest in Renault and Nissan shares, in a similar way to the cross-holding in which Nissan took 15 per cent of Renault three years after Renault's 1999 investment in Nissan. Renault now has 44 per cent. "I don't think it is a condition [ for a deal] but it is preferable," he said.