Argentina’s libertarian president, Javier Milei, has caused a political firestorm by promoting an unknown cryptocurrency token that shot up in value after his endorsement and then swiftly cratered.
In a post on social media on Friday night, Mr. Milei said that the coin, called $LIBRA, would stimulate the economy and help small businesses grow. While the sudden attention gave the token an initial boost, the huge gains were erased as fear quickly spread that the coin was a scam.
Mr. Milei deleted his social media post five hours later and attempted to distance himself from the venture.
“I was not familiar with the details of the project,” he wrote on X, “and after having informed myself I decided not to continue disseminating it (that is why I deleted the tweet).”
But Mr. Milei rapidly came under fire for his role in pushing people toward a risky investment. His dalliance with crypto also prompted comparisons with President Trump, who launched a memecoin, $Trump, last month. That token surged for a while and then crashed.
A center-left coalition that opposes Mr. Milei’s libertarian government called his crypto foray “a scandal without precedent.” Another political bloc said it was seeking to create a commission in Congress to investigate what occurred.
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