I think AY are getting very favourable terms on the A340 as a kind of insurance against problems with the 350. This deal is valued at the equal of AY's market cap, and that's just way too much money to bet on a largely unproven future aircraft concept. It must have been easier for Airbus to offer a cheap fall back route to A340 than for Boeing to offer an alternative to the 787 that Finnair would be interested in.

The terms may simply be better than AY's current MD11 economics, and not just because of fuel expenditure. Even if the MD11 metal was essentially free (and satisfactory aircraft were available), deprecating the one-time cost of converting a beat-up MD11 to AY service is only getting harder as the cut-off date of 2012 draws near.