Kamino appoints Michael Weisz as CEO to lead US and institutional expansion
Kamino brings in a new chief executive
Kamino, a lending protocol built on Solana, appointed Michael Weisz as chief executive on Sept. 15. A lending protocol is a service where users can lend or borrow crypto assets through automated rules instead of a bank.
Kamino said Weisz will lead the protocol's institutional growth and its expansion into the United States. The company also said he brings more than two decades of experience in fintech and private markets.
Key points
- Weisz was named Kamino's CEO on Sept. 15, 2026.
- His stated mandate is institutional growth and expansion into the US market.
- Kamino is a Solana-based lending protocol with $1.352 billion in total value locked and $1.022 billion in active loans, according to DefiLlama.
- Weisz said financial-services infrastructure is moving onchain and argued that tokenized assets still need liquidity, credit, distribution and infrastructure.
- Kamino did not say whether Weisz replaces a previous CEO.
What the new CEO and Kamino said
In a post introducing what he called a thesis letter, Weisz wrote that financial-services infrastructure is moving onchain, meaning more of the plumbing behind finance is being recorded and run on blockchains.
“Tokenization worked,” Weisz wrote. “But what's missing is what comes after you put an asset on-chain. That requires liquidity, credit, distribution and infrastructure.” He said Kamino has spent four years building that foundation.
Weisz described his move as leading Kamino's “next chapter.” Kamino framed that chapter as institutional growth and US expansion.
How large Kamino is
DefiLlama, a service that tracks decentralized finance activity, reports $1.352 billion in total value locked on Kamino, a common measure of assets deposited in a protocol, along with $1.022 billion in active loans.
DefiLlama ranks Kamino Lend seventh among the lending protocols it tracks, giving it 2.7% of the category's $50.438 billion in total value locked. The data provider also says Kamino's total value locked rose 29.9% over the previous 30 days and that it tracks 150 yield pools for the protocol.
DefiLlama describes Kamino Lend as a peer-to-pool borrowing system that matches borrowers and lenders. Kamino's official X profile describes the project as credit infrastructure on Solana.
What Kamino actually offers
Kamino's own documentation lists four products: Earn, Borrow, Multiply and Swap. The company says its curator tooling lets professional risk managers design custom lending strategies for institutions, set up isolated lending markets with their own risk parameters, and route depositor assets across reserves.
That tooling is the part of Kamino most directly aimed at institutional users, which is the group Weisz has been hired to grow.
What is still unclear
Kamino did not say in its announcement whether Weisz replaces another chief executive. A person named Marius publicly identifies himself as a Kamino cofounder, but the supplied material does not state his current role or whether it is changing.
The material also does not specify which US markets or products Kamino plans to enter first, what regulatory approvals might be needed, or a timeline for the expansion.
Why this matters
The appointment matters because Kamino is one of the larger lending protocols in crypto, and its new CEO is being hired to shift its focus toward professional and institutional users rather than only individual crypto traders.
Weisz's own argument is that putting assets on blockchains has already been proven to work, while the harder problem is providing the liquidity, credit and distribution around those assets. That is the problem he says Kamino is positioned to solve.
The outcome is not yet known. Kamino has announced a strategic direction, but the supplied material includes no results from that effort.
What happens next
The sources provide no specific timeline or announced next steps beyond the stated mandate of institutional growth and US expansion. Kamino has not announced a launch date, partnership, or product tied to the new CEO.
