The expiration of the free trial of a software program is the new obstacle in the case investigating the rise and fall of the cryptocurrency $Libra, an alleged transnational scam centered on the Argentine president, Javier Milei. Eight months late, the Specialized Cybercrime Prosecutor’s Unit (UFECI) responded to a request from the prosecutor leading the investigation, Eduardo Taiano, explaining that it does not have the necessary resources to analyze what could be a key element: the destination of transfers totaling nearly five million dollars that left digital wallets associated with the American Hayden Davis —CEO of the company that created $Libra— in the days before Milei promoted the cryptocurrency on his X account.
The UFECI, which had already managed to identify a series of encrypted money movements earlier, explained that at that time it had a demo of a software of high complexity used to track operations with crypto assets and identify fund flows. But the free version expired and, within the framework of the budget adjustment imposed by the State, it has not yet managed to acquire it.
The information was published by the local newspaper La Nación and corroborated by EL PAÍS from judicial sources. The requested analysis is on transfers made on three dates (January 30, 2025, February 3 and 13, 2025) totaling 4,780,100 dollars. The first of these, 499,000 dollars, coincides in day and time with a visit Davis made to Javier Milei at the Casa Rosada and all are prior to the president’s message that unleashed the internationally reaching scandal, on February 14, 2025.
The boost the president gave to that newly born digital currency caused a large number of people to buy $Libra, which reached a violent peak in valuation and then collapsed, leaving a trail of victims and a few big winners with access to privileged information. The funds for its initial operation were transferred in the five minutes prior by its developers, the same ones who a few hours later sold their holdings of the already skyrocketed currency and withdrew with profits between 80 and 100 million dollars. Part of that operation was confirmed by Davis himself, with whom Milei had signed a confidential contract 15 days earlier in which he declared him as his crypto advisor.
If the president or people around him were paid for promoting the cryptocurrency on social networks is the big question of the investigation, which has been fueled by various suspicions. Judicial experts, for example, recovered from the phone of businessman Mauricio Novelli —who would have acted as a link between Hayden Davis and the president— an alleged agreement for five million dollars for Milei’s support of the project and also dozens of calls between them on the day of the cryptocurrency launch.
“What a coincidence: the analysis they could not perform was precisely on transfers for 4,780,100 dollars, which are the funds that ended up in the hands of Mauricio Novelli, partner and man of extreme trust of Javier Milei and Karina Milei. Let us not forget that this information was provided by us from the plaintiff and was not a discovery of the prosecution, we did it without economic resources and in 10 days,” said Martín Romeo, one of the plaintiffs in the case. He also indicated that during the eight months UFECI delayed in responding no one was informed of the situation, “they simply let time pass.” “If an investigation of such magnitude really depends on a software license, we are facing a very serious institutional problem,” he pointed out.
According to EL PAÍS, prosecutor Taiano redirected the analysis request to the Federal Police, which —like other state agencies— does have the required technology, but there is no certainty about the time it will take. “They are working on it,” they assured in his office.
The final goal of the analysis is to reveal who is behind anonymous operations carried out through blockchain technology. The justice system was able to achieve this in the case of Orlando Mellino —a retiree who received more than 1 million in cryptocurrencies from Davis and whose virtual wallet circulated up to 6 million— and also in the case of Novelli and his partner Manuel Terrones Godoy, who, according to the file, between January and February 2025 received more than 730,000 digital dollars from Davis.
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