Milei talks about the $LIBRA affair
In an interview with Joni Viale, one of his main supporters within Argentine journalism, Milei took a public position on all the noise surrounding his initial endorsement of a memecoin, $LIBRA, whose value immediately rose exponentially, but then began to plummet following alerts from experts and KOLs and much more when he finally withdrew his original tweet promoting it. Several conspiracy theories are swirling around the issue exceeding Milei's potential involvement, and maybe explaining Solana's temporary depreciation. In any case, before going in with sleeve to elbow on the interview of the eccentric head of the Pink House with Viale, it is valid to note that $LIBRA is not dead, with a volume of $142.5 million in the last 24 hours in the LIBRA/USDC pair and favorable balance for buys over sells both in number of transactions and total value. In the midday hours on Monday, there was even room to gain 100% trading it, surpassing $760 million in market cap. In the LIBRA/SOL pair, it topped $800 million.
Milei's public take
Milei was rather awkward, incoherent, and unconvincing at times with Viale. According to the leader of La Libertad Avanza, the intensity of the negative conversation around $LIBRA caused him to delete his original tweet endorsing it. “I have nothing to hide. I didn't do anything wrong. As a guy who is super enthusiastic about technology, faced with the possibility that there [could be] a tool to finance projects of [Argentine] entrepreneurs, I give it diffusion.” When the journalist pressed him about the thousands who invested and lost with the memecoin, Milei launched some valid arguments to a certain extent, but controversial and sometimes unethical. The head of Balcarce 50 is going to stick to the narrative that he did not promote anything, but only “spread”.
Then, Milei says that whoever got into the $LIBRA run did so knowing that they were gambling like in a casino, and that those are people used to operating with volatile assets. It is true, but it is also true that when a president is seen directly endorsing a coin, the security index for investors increases a lot, as well as the amount of money they risk. In other words, sometimes all it takes is for Elon to say anything in X, a distant reference to anything, to generate a sense of confidence guiding people to bet big on a narrative. Why did $TRUMP rise so high in the beginning, to the point of eating up almost all of Solana's liquidity and stressing its infrastructure?
Many of us follow the so-called KOLs because we want some guidance. We want a reference in an uncertain market. So, again, it is only natural that if Argentina's president dresses as a KOL himself we almost take for granted some profit following him. It is like free money, and it would be very crass for Milei, who lavishes praise on himself for his popularity, to play dumb in this regard. $LIBRA would have been like any memecoin—that goes live and never gains traction—had it not been for Milei putting it on Solana whales´ radar. He also keeps trying to defend that being president does not imply a responsibility when communicating. He said that the “State did not play any role” in this affair, as if the endorsing tweet had been published by a random economist named Javier Milei and not the Javier Milei owner of the Rivadavia Armchair with a verified government authority profile.
The libertarian also argued that it was difficult for Argentines to be among the victims of the abrupt collapse of $LIBRA, ignoring the damage caused to actors outside the national territory. There could be an ethical complaint here. However, Milei is ignoring that just as there are Cubans like me trading in the volatile Solana market, there are also thousands of Argentines. It's not just Americans and Chinese, although they usually own the wealthiest wallets. There is a vibrant crypto community—with agency—there, ready with its finger on the trigger waiting for a life-changing opportunity like a surprise tweet from Milei with a Solana´s CA. So the number of Argentines who lost because of $LIBRA is not necessarily unrepresentative. Gerardo speaks with an extraordinary uncritical lightness about his dreams of making Argentina a technological hub, portraying the potential dynamic as something critical to repeal the hunger that swallows many children and retirees there every day, while he sleeps peacefully in Olivos.
The quick regional review
In report # 447 we refer to the tense insecurity crisis unleashed in the South American country. On Sunday night, in the violent Guayaquila sort of capital of crime, eight people were massacred in an armed attack staged in public streets. Also this Monday three teenagers were killed in another armed attack in the coastal city of Manta, province of Manabí.
SourceAlmost 30 people were killed in a new road accident in Latin America, this time in Bolivia, with about 20 injured. According to authorities, an interprovincial transport bus fell into an 800-meter-deep ravine after leaving the road in the Andean region of Potosi. Around 1,400 Bolivians lose their lives in road accidents in Bolivia every year.
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