Risk Dimensions
Insolvency Risk
Insolvency occurs when a borrower’s position becomes unhealthy (LTV exceeds the liquidation threshold) and the liquidation cannot be profitably executed — typically because the collateral token lacks sufficient market liquidity to be sold without excessive slippage. The resulting bad debt is socialized among lenders. Kamino mitigates insolvency risk through:- Rigorous asset risk assessment before onboarding any token
- Continuous market risk monitoring of volatility, liquidity, and price impact
- Conservative LTV and borrow factor parameters calibrated to market conditions
- Protocol safeguards that can unwind risky positions before bad debt materializes
Liquidity Risk
Liquidity risk arises when borrowing demand exhausts the available supply in a reserve, reaching 100% utilization. Lenders cannot withdraw until borrowers repay or new supply arrives. This does not cause financial loss — in fact, it produces exceptionally high interest rates for lenders — but it temporarily restricts withdrawals. Kamino mitigates liquidity risk through:- Interest rate curves calibrated to spike when utilization exceeds target levels, creating economic pressure for repayment
- Daily caps that limit the rate at which borrows can accumulate
- Real-time utilization monitoring with alerting
Systemic Risk
Systemic risk emerges when multiple assets on the protocol are correlated — a broad market downturn triggers liquidations across many positions simultaneously, potentially overwhelming liquidation infrastructure or liquidity. Kamino monitors token correlations and systemic exposure and uses E-Mode caps and supply caps to limit concentrated exposure.Token Onboarding
Every asset listed on Kamino undergoes a 5-dimension risk assessment before it can be used as collateral or borrowed:- Oracle Pricing Risk — reliability and redundancy of the asset’s price feeds
- Smart Contract Risk — audit history, maturity, and battle-testing of the token’s underlying contracts
- Depeg Risk — for pegged assets, the probability and impact of losing the peg
- Counterparty Risk — governance decentralization, holder concentration, and trust assumptions
- Market Risk — volatility, liquidity, and price impact dynamics
The assessment directly determines the asset’s Collateral Max LTV (how much can be borrowed against it) and Borrow Factor (the risk weight applied to the debt). Higher-risk assets receive more conservative parameters.
Onboarding is not a one-time event. The risk framework continuously reassesses listed assets. Market conditions change — an asset that was low-risk at onboarding may become high-risk if its liquidity drops, its oracle coverage narrows, or its smart contract is compromised. Parameter adjustments follow reassessment.
Battle-Tested Track Record
Kamino has operated since November 2023 with $0 bad debt across every market condition — including 5 significant stress events that tested the liquidation infrastructure and risk parameters under real-world conditions.February 2026 Stress Event — Case Study
The most severe test of Kamino’s risk framework occurred on February 5–6, 2026, when SOL dropped 18% (from $92 to $76), ETH fell ~15% (from $2,148 to $1,832), and JLP declined ~10% (from $3.83 to $3.43) over 48 hours. Scale of liquidations:- 55,649 individual liquidation events
- 30,030 wallets affected
- $19.36M in collateral seized
- $0 bad debt generated
Key finding: 99.6% of liquidations came from uncorrelated positions (e.g., SOL collateral / USDC debt). Correlated positions (e.g., JitoSOL/SOL) were barely affected, validating the LST oracle design that uses stake rates instead of market prices.
Flight to quality: During the event, deposits flowed from higher-risk markets to safer ones. The Prime market grew by +$55M in supply (+13.5%), and the Superstate market saw +56% supply growth — reflecting depositor preference for markets with tighter risk parameters during volatility.
Post-event protocol health: The protocol continued operating normally throughout the event with no degradation in service.
Detailed analysis: Risk Event Analysis — February 5–6, 2026
Monthly Risk Reports
Since early 2025, Allez Labs has published comprehensive monthly risk reports to the Kamino governance forum — over 14 reports to date. These reports cover:- Protocol-level metrics: Total supply, debt, TVL, transaction volumes, liquidation counts
- Market-by-market analysis: Supply, borrow, and utilization trends across all markets
- Stablecoin and SOL market analysis: Composition shifts, rate dynamics, LST trends
- Vault performance: TVL, curator activity, user flows across Earn Vaults
- Stress testing scenarios: Instantaneous price shock modeling at -10%, -20%, -30%, -40%, -60% levels
- User behavior analysis: Wallet activity, transaction patterns, concentration metrics
Continuous Monitoring
Risk management is not a periodic activity — it runs continuously. The following metrics are tracked in real-time:- Utilization rates per reserve (approaching 100% triggers interest rate escalation)
- LTV distributions across all active positions (clustering near liquidation thresholds indicates elevated risk)
- Oracle staleness and cross-provider deviation (signals potential oracle issues)
- Cap utilization (supply, borrow, and daily caps approaching limits)
- Liquidation-at-risk metrics (what percentage of positions would be liquidated at various price shock levels)
- Vault allocation changes (unusual curator behavior)