An Argentine federal judge has dismissed fraud charges against President Javier Milei, his sister Karina and nine other defendants over the $Libra memecoin, closing the criminal case before a trial ever began — and without a formal hearing for the accused.
Judge Marcelo Martínez de Giorgi largely followed prosecutor Eduardo Taiano's request to drop the case, ruling that the reported conduct 'does not constitute a crime' such as fraud, abuse of office or acts incompatible with public office, according to La Nación and heise online. There was, in his reading, no independent charge that justified continuing.
The underlying facts are not in dispute. $Libra launched on 14 February 2025. Milei promoted it from his own accounts as a private project meant to 'stimulate the growth of the Argentine economy and finance small businesses', with a link to buy. An estimated 40,000 people did. The token rose fast and collapsed within hours. A small group with access to inside information made millions; the large majority of speculators lost sums totalling several hundred million dollars. Milei deleted the post and said he had not been aware of the project's details.
In his ruling the judge conceded that Milei's institutional position may have given the token 'special resonance and visibility'. That, he argued, is not the same as a 'fraudulent device'. No criminally relevant deception had been proven. Investigators also found no evidence that Karina Milei was paid for arranging meetings between the entrepreneurs behind the coin and her brother.
That is precisely where the criticism lands. The opposition argues the case was closed before evidence gathering finished, without summoning the defendants and while excluding victims as plaintiffs. Pedro Biscay of the Centre for the Study and Prevention of Economic Crime (CIPCE), which joined the case as amicus curiae, told La Nación the decision was 'premature': the president's central role in spreading the asset had to be argued in a public oral trial. It would be unacceptable, he said, for an investigation of this scope to end early and cement a 'pact of impunity'.
Milei called it a 'political and media operation' aimed at damaging the presidency and at a 'coup attempt'. 'And who compensates me now for a year, eight months and nine days of lies, slander and insults?' he wrote online.
The political backdrop is part of the story. Barely two months after the crash, Argentina's congress created an investigative committee over the government's objection. A task unit meant to examine the roles of Javier and Karina Milei, the Unidade de Tareas de Investigación, was dissolved by the president three months after it was created.
Why it matters beyond Argentina: the legal question — was there a crime? — now has a clear answer, no. The accountability question got a procedural one instead. A head of state promoting a token that cost retail investors hundreds of millions of dollars produced no criminal liability, and that becomes the reference point for how far promotional responsibility reaches when a politician amplifies a crypto asset. The case also carries every marker of a classic rug pull — launch a coin, collect the money, leave holders with worthless tokens — except that the promoter held the presidency. The ruling settles the criminal track only; it does not answer what civil remedies investors might have.
