Kamino Finance Launches Fixed-Rate Multiply Vault on Solana with 5.3% Locked Borrow Rate

Kamino Finance KMNO$0.036-3.3% launched its first Fixed Rate Multiply vault on September 21, built in partnership with Figure and HastraFi, offering users a locked 5.3% annual borrow rate on the AUTO/wYLDS strategy for rolling 30-day terms on Solana.

The launch activates a credit primitive the protocol has been building since its "Next Chapter" governance roadmap in late 2025. Onchain lending has operated almost entirely on variable rates, where a borrower's cost shifts daily with pool utilization. Kamino's Fixed Rates locks that cost for the full term. "The rate you see is the rate you pay, from day one through expiry, regardless of market conditions or pool utilizations," the protocol stated in its product documentation.

How the AUTO/wYLDS Fixed Rate Multiply Vault Works

The vault gives users a single-click path to loop AUTO, HastraFi's yield-bearing token backed by Figure's tokenized auto loan portfolio, at a fixed 5.3% annual borrow rate. Kamino's launch announcement projects up to 20% net APY on the resulting position through the AUTO/wYLDS Multiply market.

Entry and exit carry no price impact because the vault connects directly to Figure's mint and redeem infrastructure rather than an open market order book. At term expiry, loans auto-roll into the next 30-day period at the prevailing fixed rate, subject to available liquidity. If rollover liquidity is unavailable, the loan migrates to a variable-rate position; if that also fails, the protocol repays the debt gradually using the borrower's collateral through its Auto-repay mechanism.

AUTO: HastraFi's Yield-Bearing Token on Figure's Auto Loan Pool

AUTO is HastraFi's yield-bearing token giving holders exposure to a pool of Figure's tokenized auto loans. Figure, which has unlocked more than $30 billion in consumer equity through its blockchain lending platform, extended its loan tokenization infrastructure to the auto market. HastraFi built AUTO as a Solana-native yield-bearing asset on that base.

The structure lets DeFi protocols treat AUTO as collateral with predictable yield characteristics, unlike volatile crypto assets. Kamino's Fixed Rate Multiply pairs that stable-yield collateral with a locked borrow cost, giving users a defined carry: borrow at a known rate, earn AUTO's underlying yield, and capture the spread on the looped position.

Fixed-Rate Architecture Built on $16B in Processed Loans

Kamino's fixed-rate reserves are structurally separate from its variable-rate pools. Each reserve is defined by a specific rate-duration combination with no liquidity interaction between distinct reserves, so variable-rate pool utilization cannot contaminate fixed-rate pricing.

The product draws on Kamino's existing lending contracts, which have processed $16 billion in loans, handled $183 million in liquidations, and maintained zero bad debt for lenders across 18 audits and three formal verifications by Certora and OtterSec. Craig Birchall, Head of Lending at FalconX, which participated in an earlier fixed-rate pilot ahead of this launch, said the product let the firm minimize rate volatility and duration-match in a way not previously available in onchain credit.

Why Variable-Rate DeFi Borrowing Falls Short for Structured Strategies

Variable-rate DeFi loans have historically swung between roughly 3% and 10% annually based on pool utilization, according to Kamino's governance documentation. That volatility makes them unsuitable for strategies built around real-world assets, which require predictable funding costs to model returns over fixed income periods.

The AUTO/wYLDS vault is the first live Fixed Rate Multiply product on Kamino. The protocol's fixed-rate framework supports multiple term lengths, with which rate-duration combinations are active determined by curators and governance rather than fixed in the contracts. The Galaxy-curated institutional USDC and USDT vaults that launched on Kamino five days earlier target lenders seeking institutional-grade yield; this week's Fixed Rate Multiply targets borrowers seeking fixed-cost credit against yield-bearing collateral.