Javier Milei, Elected President of Argentina, Opens Up About Bitcoin

JAKARTA - Javier Milei, who has been friendly towards Bitcoin, succeeded in winning the second round of presidential elections in Argentina on November 19. He  defeated his opponent SergioBitcoinに友好的なアルゼンチン選出大統領Javier Milei（写真：x @JMilei） Massa. Now almost 99% of the votes have been counted. According to Bloomberg data, Milei won more than 55% of the vote, with a lead of almost 3 million votes.

The prolonged inflation crisis in Argentina is a hot topic, with the Argentine peso recording an annual inflation increase of 140% in the last 12 months. Milei has been vocal in criticizing the country's central bank. He called it a fraud and "a mechanism by which politicians cheat good people with inflation taxes."

Milei considers Bitcoin a movement toward “returning money to its original creators, the private sector.” Despite this, there has been no signal that he plans to make Bitcoin a legal tender in the country.

Massa's views on the money, banking and cryptocurrency industry seem to be the opposite of Milei's. In October, Massa pledged to launch a central bank digital currency (CBDC) if elected to “address” Argentina's long-running inflation crisis.

Although Massa won the first round of Argentina's presidential election in October, it was not enough to become president outright, triggering a second round of elections. Previously, Milei won Argentina's primary election against Massa and other candidates in August. Milei is scheduled to take office on December 10.