Breaking! A Country's President Caught Red-Handed Promoting Meme Coin for $5 Million—Has the Global Regulatory Mask Been Completely Torn Off?

Argentine media revealed an investigative report. The investigators reconstructed an agreement from a cryptocurrency lobbyist’s phone. The agreement shows that President Javier Milei was paid $5 million to promote the $LIBRA token.

This document was created three days before Milei posted his famous tweet. According to the agreement, the behind-the-scenes Hayden Davis was to pay an initial $1.5 million deposit. After Milei announced on social media that Davis was his advisor, another $1.5 million was to be paid. The final $2 million was tied to a blockchain consulting contract.

On February 15, 2025, Milei’s tweet arrived as scheduled. He claimed that $LIBRA was a private project aimed at promoting Argentina’s economic growth. Market sentiment was instantly ignited, and the token’s fully diluted valuation surged to a high of $4.56 billion within half an hour.

What happened next was like a carefully orchestrated harvest. Numerous pre-positioned addresses began withdrawing liquidity and selling off tokens. Over one hundred million dollars were cashed out within one or two hours. Milei deleted the tweet at noon that day, and the price of $LIBRA dropped to zero.

From the tweet to the project’s collapse, the entire process took less than one morning.

Faced with public pressure, Milei’s initial explanation seemed weak. He first claimed he only supported private enterprises and was unaware of the details, saying he was “innocently deceived.” He then argued that most of the harmed investors were American and Chinese citizens, and that no harm was done to his own countrymen. Finally, he dismissed criticism as “political struggle.”

However, evidence recovered from the phone made these defenses untenable. The investigation also uncovered materials from Milei’s cryptocurrency courses, directly exposing his lie that he was unfamiliar with cryptocurrencies.

Even more crucial was the call records. Within hours before and after Milei’s tweet, lobbyist Mauricio Novelli had intensive calls with Milei and his sister, who is the Secretary-General of the presidential office. The timing was perfectly aligned, indicating an organized financial scam.

From the perspective of agreement execution, only the first step may have been completed. Milei had not yet posted a tweet appointing Davis as an advisor when the scam was exposed due to early cash-out, forcing the president to cut ties urgently. Davis later confirmed in an interview that more planned interactions were supposed to happen, but the cooperation was abruptly terminated.

On-chain analysis had already pointed to Hayden Davis and his control of Kelsier Ventures. Further investigation revealed that by late January 2025, Davis had met with Milei at the presidential palace and signed a contract to serve as Argentina’s blockchain advisor. Subsequently, accounts associated with Davis transferred $1 million to an anonymous account.

The chain of events is becoming clearer: lobbyist referral, signing the advisor contract, reaching promotional agreement, presidential statement, insider cash-out, project collapse. Milei’s team perhaps expected this to be a “slow bull” scam, but greed among accomplices caused the plan to spiral out of control instantly.

What is most chilling about this incident is the self-awareness of the orchestrators. Hayden Davis, in an interview, openly stated that in the meme market, this is not illegal—it’s just the rules of the game. “This isn’t capital markets; it’s a casino.”

When industry participants—especially those with resources and influence—truly believe that the industry’s essence is a casino, the bottom lines of trust, technology, and long-term value will vanish. Competition will no longer be about building but about who can “grab” faster, harder, and more ruthlessly.

This perhaps provides a cold footnote to many recent chaos in the industry.

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