Following the Eurogroup meeting, there were no decisions communicated, which is no surprise as no issues were on the table for decision. However, the Spanish situation was subject of talks. After the meeting, IMF’s Lagarde who attended the meeting, said that IMF teams were in Spain since the previous week and were identifying how to fix Spain’s fiscal gap. While Spain has not officially asked for support and is vague over eventual intention to ask it, the comments of Lagarde suggest that Spain is probably closer to ask officially for help. The Spanish grandstanding on the issue (we maybe don’t need help) is probably only tactics to get as few conditions attached to the support as possible. Indeed, the Spanish Economy Minister pledged a plan of reforms to boost growth and competitiveness by the end of September. Euro group president Juncker said that the Finance Ministers will inaugurate the ESM on October 8 and pay the first two equity instalments of €32B euro by the end of October. All pieces of the puzzle are slowly falling into place for Spain to ask formally for an ESM rescue package. IMF’s Lagarde was very upbeat on Ireland and Portugal, whose programmes are a real successes. On Greece, she suggested that Greece may get more time to meet its budget-cutting targets. This seems to have admitted by the finance ministers, but the financing issue has been shifted forward with some rumours already suggesting towards November.