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Last night's farewell gala in Frankfurt for ECB president Jean-Claude Trichet, who steps down at the end of the month, was a lavish affair by all accounts. The two-hour event at Frankfurt's historic Alte Oper concert hall, interspersed with musical interludes, was attended by a number of political dignitaries such as former French president Valery Giscard d'Estaing and former German chancellor Helmut Schmidt who fell over themselves to praise Trichet as a great European. Schmidt, wheeled onto the stage in a wheelchair, used the opportunity to lash out at the "dramatic inability of the EU's political bodies to curb the dangerous turbulence and uncertainty". Only the ECB directorate, under Trichet's leadership, he said, had proved effective and able to act. "The constant talk of a 'euro crisis' is mere chatter on the part of politicians and journalists," Schmidt said. "In truth, we have a crisis in the ability to act of the EU's political bodies. This inability to act is a much bigger danger for the future of Europe than the over-indebtedness of individual eurozone countries." Trichet, who turns 69 in December, will hand over to Italy's Mario Draghi on 31 October. The farewell gala began with a short film spanning the Frenchman's eight-year reign and ended with a concert by the Mozart Orchestra under its founder and chief conductor, the legendary Italian maestro Claudio Abbado.

The Spanish and French bond auctions have gone reasonably well this morning. Spain sold €3.91bn of government bonds in its first auction since Moody's cut the country's sovereign rating by two notches on Tuesday. France sold €7.49bn of fixed coupon bond and is due to sell inflation-linked debt later, only days after Moody's warned its top credit rating could be under threat.