Argentine President Milei Cleared of Misconduct Over LIBRA Promotion: Report

Argentine President Javier Milei was cleared of wrongdoing over his promotion of the LIBRA memecoin in February, the Buenos Aires Herald reported on Saturday.

A resolution issued Friday by the country's anti-corruption office argued that the president was speaking "as an economist and not a public official," when he shared news of LIBRA on X.

The president's personal account "was created long before he was elected country president, and even before the beginning of his previous term as deputy," according to the resolution, signed by Alejandro Melik, the head of the country's anti-corruption office.

Milei's post about the Solana-based memecoin promoted it as a project designed to help small and medium-sized Argentine companies raise capital. LIBRA surged to a market capitalization of around $4.5 billion.

He deleted the post only hours later, saying that he had not been aware of the details of the project when he promoted it. In the ensuing sell-off, LIBRA crashed by 90%, wiping out over $4 billion in value.

On-chain data from Nansen showed that 86% of traders lost a total of $251 million, with the remainder securing $180 million in profits.

To make matters worse, it was revealed Libra's co-creator Hayden Davis bragged in text messages about his influence over Milei because of payments he had been making to Karina Milei, the president's sister and a powerful figure in his government.

Read more: Milei Closes Down LIBRA Investigative Unit After It Shares Findings With Prosecutors