A federal judge in Argentina has ordered the identification and freezing of 25 cryptocurrency wallets connected to the $LIBRA memecoin scandal, the sprawling investigation that traces back to a token publicly promoted by President Javier Milei before it cratered in spectacular fashion. The order, issued by Judge Marcelo Martínez de Giorgi, hits wallets across some of the biggest exchanges in the industry: Binance, Bybit, OKX, and Bitfinex.
According to analyst Fernando Molina, no actual funds have been frozen from those wallets yet. The order is on paper. The money, apparently, is not sitting around waiting to be caught.
What happened with LIBRA
The $LIBRA memecoin launched on February 14, 2025. Argentine President Javier Milei publicly promoted the token, which was enough to send buyers flooding in. The price spiked. Then it collapsed almost immediately, leaving investors holding digital bags worth a fraction of what they paid.
Investigators now estimate the losses from the LIBRA incident exceed $250 million. The allegations center on what critics have called a rug pull, a scenario where insiders extract liquidity from a project while retail investors are left watching the chart go vertical in the wrong direction. Key figures implicated in the investigation include lobbyist Mauricio Novelli and Hayden Davis, a US businessman associated with Kelsier Ventures.
