Javier Milei backtracks on $4.4B memecoin after 'insiders' pocket $87M • Hacker News Board

Re: Javier Milei backtracks on $4.4B memecoin after 'insiders' pocket $87M

#241

Post by dysoco » Mon, Feb 17, 2025, 12:48 PM UTC

mrbombastic wrote: post #234

dysoco wrote: post #69

Just to clarify, here are some important differences compared to the Trump case: 1. Milei did not sell this as a memecoin at all, unlike Trump, he sold it as a "financial instrument to help finance small Argentinan enterprises". 2. Trump tweeted about $TRUMP BEFORE stepping into office, Milei is already the president of Argentina. This constitutes an obvious ethical violation, and possibly a legal one as well. 3. 80%…

I know very little about Milei other than a few articles I have read but as someone who has been visiting Argentina on and off for the last 3 years, it does seem to me he has at least stabilized the currency much more than previous admins? I remember the bluerate for dollars being double the previous almost every time I returned and has now stabilized at around 1200 per dollar. I leave no comment on the rest of his p…

The price of the dollar doesn't mean too much, the real cost in USD of living is through the roof and the official inflation index is not reflecting that, what's worse, if your salary is in USD or was tied to USD now you earn even less because they are pegging it so it doesn't go up.

Perhaps he did slow down the inflation a bit, sure, but it's easy to cut government spending when you are basically going into debt with your citizens, not paying government salaries, government contracts, etc. Pretty much everyone in the public scientific or health sector has seen their purchasing power slashed to half, and some of those haven't been paid for a couple of months either.

Re: Javier Milei backtracks on $4.4B memecoin after 'insiders' pocket $87M

#242

Post by argentinian » Mon, Feb 17, 2025, 12:51 PM UTC

Daishiman wrote: post #190

levanten wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I dont know which scenario is worse for a president, an experienced economist like him not understanding what he was endorsing or being part of the scam.

He is not an experienced economist. He holds a Master's from a third-rate private university and a doctorate from a degree mill. This myth needs to die.

He worked for various years as senior economist in a bank, and a high position in an economy consulting firm.

You are systematically commenting trying to harm his reputation in issues not linked to his disreputable act of promotion of the shitcoin.

Re: Javier Milei backtracks on $4.4B memecoin after 'insiders' pocket $87M

#243

Post by ekkiren » Mon, Feb 17, 2025, 12:52 PM UTC

Yes, Milei is a amazing economist. Yes, Milei and his team are improving the Argentinian economy more than anyone could have ever imagined after a single year. Yes, Milei f*cked up incredibly and might be subject to legal consequences.

All three are true at the same time. Don't mix things up.

Re: Javier Milei backtracks on $4.4B memecoin after 'insiders' pocket $87M

#244

Post by xinayder » Mon, Feb 17, 2025, 12:53 PM UTC

mrbombastic wrote: post #234

dysoco wrote: post #69

Just to clarify, here are some important differences compared to the Trump case: 1. Milei did not sell this as a memecoin at all, unlike Trump, he sold it as a "financial instrument to help finance small Argentinan enterprises". 2. Trump tweeted about $TRUMP BEFORE stepping into office, Milei is already the president of Argentina. This constitutes an obvious ethical violation, and possibly a legal one as well. 3. 80%…

I know very little about Milei other than a few articles I have read but as someone who has been visiting Argentina on and off for the last 3 years, it does seem to me he has at least stabilized the currency much more than previous admins? I remember the bluerate for dollars being double the previous almost every time I returned and has now stabilized at around 1200 per dollar. I leave no comment on the rest of his p…

In 2015 Brazilians could do a lot in Argentina for as low as R$30.

Nowadays, buying food costs almost R$120 ($20 in todays rate).

Inflation can be stable, but cost of living has gone through the roof for almost a decade now, and Milei managed to speedrun it to a point that a lot of Argentinians are below the line of poverty.

Re: Javier Milei backtracks on $4.4B memecoin after 'insiders' pocket $87M

#245

Post by ekkiren » Mon, Feb 17, 2025, 12:54 PM UTC

karparov wrote: post #162

Panzer04 wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whatever the stupidity around this memecoin, it's hard to argue he isn't doing something to help the argentinian economy. It turns out it doesn't take much to appear to be an economic genius - just stop spending money the government doesn't have and get rid of onerous market regulations (eg. rent controls). I'm in support of social spending to support those in need, but it's clear Argentina was moving ever-further aw…

> stop spending money the government doesn't have That shows quite the misconception about what "money" actually is.

[flagged]

Re: Javier Milei backtracks on $4.4B memecoin after 'insiders' pocket $87M

#246

Post by xinayder » Mon, Feb 17, 2025, 12:59 PM UTC

zone411 wrote: post #216

Daishiman wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Whatever the stupidity around this memecoin, it's hard to argue he isn't doing something to help the argentinian economy. Installed industrial capacity at its lowest, real cost in USD through the roof, large corporations that have been around for _decades_ shutting down because of a lack of demand, the shutdown of government programs for vaccine distribution and HIV immune therapy, the complete and absolute mismana…

You meant utilization not capacity. Your other points are similarly confused. Argentinians disagree. "The percentage of Argentines who say their standard of living is getting better (53%) has inched above the majority level for the first time since 2015." https://news.gallup.com/poll/654089/javier-milei-argentina-c... "Argentina's monthly inflation rate dropped to 2.2% in January, its lowest since mid-2020 after libe…

Dropped to 2.2% after a 120% inflation in the past years?

Compared to before Milei, costs are completely high and people who could live with their (now considered low) income are barely surviving.

You can say he's fixing it, but at the same time pretty much driving almost the whole population into poverty. And then the next president will have to deal with it and probably undo whatever Milei did. It's unsustainable.

Re: Javier Milei backtracks on $4.4B memecoin after 'insiders' pocket $87M

#247

Post by littlestymaar » Mon, Feb 17, 2025, 1:00 PM UTC

karparov wrote: post #237

andriesm wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I interpret "government should stop spending money they don't have" metaphorically as standing in for "don't spend so much money (especially in economically unproductive ways) that it devalues money and misallocates resources so much that it slows down economic growth". I think simplistic statements "government should not spend money it doesn't have" or "government should stop spending so much money" are all just the…

That's too much of a balanced take though than touted by lots of populists. Germany put it recently into their constitution that new debt is strictly limited, literally called the "debt brake". That overlooks all the nuances you just explained and in the worst case can cripple the German economy. German politics is full of folks demanding the "black zero", meaning essentially no (new) state debt. It's the literal sen…

The worst thing about Germany is how the conservatives have brainwashed their citizens into believing that Hitler came to power “because of high inflation” because they wanted people to forget that Hitler came because of their policies (especially Brüning's deflationary policies). And in the end, with the debt break they just constitutionalized the economic policy that put the Nazi to power, and now unsurprisingly the AfD is booming.

Re: Javier Milei backtracks on $4.4B memecoin after 'insiders' pocket $87M

#248

Post by xinayder » Mon, Feb 17, 2025, 1:05 PM UTC

otherme123 wrote: post #233

Daishiman wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In the same link, economy is growing/expected at 4.5% this year. We have had these projections for every government since 2001 that have been sheer conjecture just like in 2017. This means nothing. > This is the fallacy of composition: "is he was wrong about this then it is wrong about absolutely everything he does" Is is obvious that you have never seen the man tweet or be interviewed about anything of substance.…

And yet, he just did the most impressive turn on a economy on the run towards a hyperinflation ever seen. There are a lot of things I don't like about Milei: this memecoin event is bad, but so is his political friendship with open self declared fascists, him being a libertarian. He is a populist. But about macro economics he is doing, at least, good. Anyone who refuses to acknowledge that minimum is simply a hater th…

I don't see his feats as impressive when he was responsible for putting more than half of the population in poverty when he started.

You can look at these numbers and say it's an improvement, but half of the population is still considered poor and the rate at which it's decreasing is not fast enough to consider Milei as a "genius".

Re: Javier Milei backtracks on $4.4B memecoin after 'insiders' pocket $87M

#249

Post by simiones » Mon, Feb 17, 2025, 1:06 PM UTC

karparov wrote: post #238

littlestymaar wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think simplistic statements "government should not spend money it doesn't have" or "government should stop spending so much money" are all just the normal average person's way of trying to phrase this fundamental economic truth that anyone with a working brain can intuit. There Is Always a Well-Known Solution to Every Human Problem—Neat, Plausible, and Wrong > It's also obvious to anyone, that just like eating to…

Wouldn't an economic indicator for the "right level" be nice? Maintained by some economic research institute (without some obvious agenda)? Or does that already exist, I just don't know it? Maybe it's not just one-dimensional though, i.e., it could matter where exactly spending occurs.

There's no such thing as an economic institute without an obvious agenda, and generally no way that we know to compute the optimal spending. And even if there was some way to decide how much to spend, there would still be the insurmountable problem of deciding what to spend this money on.

It's pretty obvious that some uses of money are more useful than others - if the state spent large amounts of money on buying snow and storing it in the sun, that's not going to have the same kind of effect as spending the exact same amount of money on building new roads. But beyond obviously silly examples, no one can really agree on even the basics of the effects of government spending in other areas.

For example, a question like "if the government pays very large pensions and social aids, does that increase the economy as much as spending the same amount of money on subsidizing private business?" is extremely divisive in economic circles - with opposing schools of economics claiming opposite results as the "obvious scientific answer".

Re: Javier Milei backtracks on $4.4B memecoin after 'insiders' pocket $87M

#250

Post by koolba » Mon, Feb 17, 2025, 1:10 PM UTC

dysoco wrote: post #69

Just to clarify, here are some important differences compared to the Trump case: 1. Milei did not sell this as a memecoin at all, unlike Trump, he sold it as a "financial instrument to help finance small Argentinan enterprises". 2. Trump tweeted about $TRUMP BEFORE stepping into office, Milei is already the president of Argentina. This constitutes an obvious ethical violation, and possibly a legal one as well. 3. 80%…

> 80% of the marketshare was concentrated in just 10 accounts, these accounts made transactions at 0-1 seconds after the president's tweet. There was some clear insider training here.

Not ruling it out, but it’s just as possible that there are bots analyzing the X accounts of leaders and other notable people to jump in front of any such actions.

Would simply be a matter of parsing for something that looks like a token address or links to the same. Buck shot some small amount that is sure to balloon when it actually hits. You’ll get burned by scams and account hijacks, but just one payoff would surely cover it all.