- A trader used insider info to turn $2.02M into $6.72M on $LIBRA before it crashed 95%, sparking major manipulation concerns.
- Milei’s X account promoted $LIBRA, but insiders controlled 82% of the supply, leading to a market cap drop from $4.5B to $200M.
- Kip Protocol denies wrongdoing but remains tied to $LIBRA’s failed launch, leaving investors wary amid transparency concerns.
A trader who previously made $1.3 million on TRUMP tokens leveraged insider knowledge to pocket $6.72 million on $LIBRA. Before its launch, the trader created two wallets and transferred funds. As soon as $LIBRA went live, he spent $2.02 million to buy 5.08 million tokens.
Shortly after, he sold them for $8.74 million, securing massive profits. Meanwhile, Argentinian President Javier Milei has distanced himself from the disastrous launch of the Solana-based memecoin, which lost nearly 95% of its value within hours.
Milei’s Connection and the Rapid Crash
The memecoin was initially promoted on Milei’s official X account, raising concerns about manipulation and false economic promises. At 5:01 PM ET, the account posted that $LIBRA was a private initiative aimed at funding Argentina’s small businesses. However, the token’s official website, hastily registered before the launch, offered minimal transparency. A Google Form was the only tool available for funding applications, deepening skepticism.
On-chain analytics firm Bubblemaps soon revealed that less than ten insiders had already extracted $87.4 million. Alarmingly, 82% of the token’s supply was concentrated in a single cluster. This concentration enabled large holders to manipulate liquidity pools on Meteora, extracting profits at the expense of retail investors. Consequently, the token’s market cap plummeted from $4.5 billion to just $200 million.
Kip Protocol’s Role and Future Prospects
Kip Protocol, a decentralized AI company, became the only project to explicitly associate itself with $LIBRA. Founder Julian Peh denied any insider trading allegations and insisted that no funds had been sold. “The funds are still on-chain, and not a single SOL will be moved,” Peh stated. Despite the controversy, he affirmed that his team still intends to pursue Project Libertad, the initiative behind $LIBRA. However, he provided no further details on how they plan to recover from the scandal.
At the time of writing, the price of Libra was exchanged at $0.000681, with a 24-hour trading volume of $98,755.37. The token has appreciated by 2.74% in the last 24 hours, with indications of a modest recovery. Confidence among investors remains fragile, however, due to transparency and manipulation fears.
