Milei's cryptofraud scandal
Feb. 17, 2025
Argentine President Javier Milei faces legal actions and public anger after first promoting a crypto token on Friday and, hours later, retracting that support. The value of $LIBRA surged in minutes, but later collapsed, causing millions of dollars in losses to its brief investors, reports the Associated Press. (See also El País.)
More than 100 lawsuits were presented over the weekend, from affected investors and politicians, reports Página 12. (See also Buenos Aires Herald.) There is at least one criminal accusation presented before the U.S. FBI, reports La Nación.
He presented the coin as an investment tool that would be good for the country, but critics compare the move to U.S. President Donald Trump’s launch of a cryptocoin last month. Opposition politicians say it could be grounds for impeachment.
“The incident was shocking not only because it is illegal for elected officials to advertise private ventures but also because the project seemed to be a fraud,” reports the Buenos Aires Herald.
Argentina’s fintech chamber acknowledged that the case could potentially be a “rug pull,” in which the developers of a crypto token draw legitimate investments, pumping up the value, only to later dump their stake, reports Reuters.
Milei said that he had no personal ties to the crypto token and lashed out at his critics, who he said were trying to score political points, reports the New York Times.
But La Nación’s Hugo Alconada Mon reports that he has direct and indirect links to the people behind the cryptocoin. While the token crashed, a shadowy group of investors kept between 87 and 107 million dollars. And a U.S. businessman involved in the cryptocurrency world, Charles Hoskin, alleged that people involved in $LIBRA had offered him access to Milei in exchange for money. (La Nación)
Regional Relations
Brazil has asked the UN to throw out plans for a new levy on global shipping that would raise funds to fight the climate crisis — arguing that the tax could reduce exports from the developing world, raise food prices and increase inequalities. (Guardian)
The U.S. Central Intelligence Agency “is poised to take a larger, more aggressive role under President Donald Trump in the battle against Mexican-based drug cartels, devising and evaluating plans to share more intelligence with regional governments, train local counternarcotics units and possibly conduct other covert actions,” reports the Washington Post.
The draft list of criminal groups the U.S. will designate as foreign terrorist organizations (see last Thursday’s post) “appears to be a balance among the criminal groups. You can imagine a different scenario in which the US designated just the CJNG or just the Cartel del Noreste and that designation would potentially benefit the cartel’s rival. Instead, the US is designating both of the giant Tier 1 cartels as well as a mix of other mid-size groups that compete with each other,” explains the Latin America Risk Report, though it also notes relevant groups left off the list.
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum warned U.S. gunmakers they could face fresh legal action as accomplices of organized crime if Washington designates the country’s cartels as terrorist groups. “If they declare these criminal groups as terrorists, then we’ll have to expand our US lawsuit,” she said at her daily press conference last Friday. (Guardian)
The U.S. presidential special envoy for Latin America, Mauricio Claver-Carone sat down with Politico to discuss the region. Regarding pressure on countries to receive deportees he said: “I don’t think we’re being tough on allies. We’re actually asking countries to live up to their own responsibilities. It’s each country’s responsibility to take back their own citizens.”
Migration
Three immigrants who won a restraining order against the U.S. federal government to avoid transfer to the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base in Cuba were deported last week on direct flights to Venezuela, reports the Associated Press.
“If the past is any guide, rather than accelerating Trump’s drive for unprecedented mass deportations, the Guantánamo migrant detention plan is destined to repeat the cruelty, confusion, protracted legal battles and staggering financial costs that have defined US detentions at Guantánamo since the September 11 attacks,” argue Karen J Greenberg and Mike Lehnert in the Guardian.
Arrests for illegal crossings at the U.S. southern border have fallen dramatically from an all-time monthly high of 250,000 in December 2023, more so in the weeks since Trump took office, reports the Associated Press.
Mexico
Mexico’s Sheinbaum administration, in coordination with Mexican business leaders, has been working against the clock to defuse Trump’s tariff threats — in addition to the security deployment announced earlier this month, Mexico could offer the U.S. greater customs vigilance, changes in rules of origen for the USMC agreement (in order to reduce Chinese imports) and greater barriers to Asian imports, reports El País.
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum presented an anti-nepotism bill that would prohibit relatives of an outgoing government from running to succeed it, a move that targets municipalities and states that have been controlled for successive administrations by single families, reports El País.
Ecuador
Third place candidate Leonidas Iza could be kingmaker in Ecuador’s April runoff presidential election between incumbent Daniel Noboa and Correista Luisa González. The choice is between “González, who is not left and the borderline fascist right of Noboa,” the Indigenous activist told El País.
Organized crime is a key concern in Ecuador’s presidential race, the Guardian covers how scientists conducting fieldwork in critical ecosystems are affected by the security crisis.
Haiti
Trump’s foreign aid freeze is further complicating the situation in Haiti: 60 percent the country’s humanitarian aid last year came from the U.S. and U.S. Agency for International Development supports 40 percent of primary-care services and 170 clinics. (Washington Post)
Colombia
People displaced by violence in Colombia’s Catatumbo region fear returning home because of landmines, reports La Silla Vacía.
Cuba
Cuba closed schools and told non-essential workers to stay home on Friday after the failure of a major power plant caused widespread blackouts across the island, where faltering electric supply has wreaked havoc over the past year. (Reuters)
Brazil
Trump's return to power has rekindled the hopes of the Brazilian far right ahead of next year’s presidential election — though former president Jair Bolsonaro is legally prohibited from running for office after being convicted for abuse of power in 2023. (AFP)
A young man from an isolated Indigenous tribe who approached a riverine community in Brazil’s Amazon returned voluntarily to his people less than 24 hours later, reports the Associated Press.
Brazilian criminals are targeting pharmacies for Ozempic, Wegovy and Saxenda, the expensive, injectable weight-loss drugs coveted by many people in a body-image obsessed country, reports the New York Times.
Critter Corner
The Buenos Aires provincial government has approved wildlife population control plans, involving selective sterilization and contraceptives, for the burgeoning capybara population — but advocates say the focus should instead be on preserving the wetlands where growing real-estate development has encroached on the rodents’ natural habitat, reports the Guardian. (Full disclosure: the Latin America Daily Briefing is Team Capybara.)