TL;DR
- Kamino Finance has appointed Michael Weisz as CEO.
- Weisz co-founded alternative-investment platform Yieldstreet.
- His role will center on U.S. expansion and institutional credit products.
Kamino Finance is bringing in a CEO with a background much closer to private credit than traditional crypto.
The Solana-based DeFi platform has appointed Michael Weisz, co-founder of Yieldstreet, to lead the company as it pushes further into the U.S. and institutional lending markets.
That is a fairly deliberate hire.
Yieldstreet built its business around alternative investments and private-market products for a broader investor base.
Kamino is increasingly trying to bridge similar financial activity into on-chain markets.
Solana DeFi Wants Bigger Borrowers
Kamino is already one of the largest lending platforms on Solana.
Historically, most DeFi lending has revolved around crypto-native collateral and users.
The institutional opportunity is different.
Funds and companies want structured credit, predictable risk parameters, compliance infrastructure and deeper pools of capital.
That requires a different type of organization around the protocol.
Hiring a CEO with conventional alternative-investment experience suggests Kamino is taking that side of the business seriously.
DeFi Companies Are Starting To Look Like Companies
There is also a broader shift here.
Early DeFi protocols often presented themselves almost entirely as software.
Governance tokens, anonymous contributors and DAOs were supposed to replace conventional corporate structure.
Reality has become messier.
Protocols still need sales, partnerships, risk teams, legal structures and executives if they want to work with large institutions.
That does not necessarily make the underlying protocol less decentralized.
It means the businesses building around those protocols are becoming more conventional.
Kamino’s appointment of Weisz fits neatly into that pattern.
The protocol remains on Solana.
The company around it is positioning itself much more like a financial-services business.
Source: Kamino Finance. https://medium.com/kamino-finance/announcing-michael-weisz-as-ceo-2026
This article was written by the News Desk and edited by Samuel Rae.
