Did this spark a "civil war" in Solana? What exactly are Kamino and Jupiter fighting over?

Written by: 0xjs

Kamino Finance and Jupiter (especially its newly launched Jupiter Lend product) are two leading DeFi protocols in the Solana ecosystem, focusing on lending and aggregator/liquidity management, respectively.

In early December 2025, a public debate erupted between them, mainly revolving around risk disclosure, product segregation, and competitive behavior. This "civil war" has attracted widespread attention from the Solana community, even forcing Lily Liu, president of the Solana Foundation, to publicly intervene, calling on both sides to stop their mutual attacks and instead focus on ecosystem growth.

While the dispute is intense, it has not yet resulted in significant economic losses (Jupiter Lend TVL still exceeds $1 billion), and is more of a test of ecosystem trust and transparency.

I. The Focus of the Debate: What exactly are they arguing about?

     1. Jupiter Lend's "Zero Risk" Claim Controversy:

• Jupiter Lend launched in August 2025 and quickly grew to $1 billion in TVL. It advertised its "vaults" as having "isolated risk" and "zero contagion risk," claiming "no cross-contamination" between different trading pairs to attract user deposits.

• Competitors like Kamino accused this of misleading advertising. The actual mechanism uses rehypothecation: user collateral (such as SOL) is reused across vaults, meaning a loss in one vault could indirectly affect others, leading to potential contagion risk.

• The actual mechanism uses rehypothecation: user collateral (such as SOL) is reused across vaults, meaning a loss in one vault could indirectly affect others, leading to potential contagion risk.

Kamino founder Marius Ciubotariu publicly stated that this "undermined confidence in Solana DeFi," and used charts to illustrate "full cross-asset exposure." Jupiter COO Kash Dhanda admitted that earlier statements were "inaccurate," deleted the relevant tweets, and promised to update the documentation after the Breakpoint meeting. However, they defended themselves by stating that the isolation only referred to the configuration level and that the protocol performed well during the October market crash. 2. Kamino's "blacklisting" behavior: Kamino quietly modified its contracts to prevent users from directly migrating/refinancing from Kamino to Jupiter Lend (via Jupiter's Refinance tool). Kamino claimed this was to protect users and avoid exposing their funds to "undisclosed risks." Jupiter founder Luca Netz criticized this as "user-hostile behavior," violating the open principles of DeFi and potentially forcing users into negative APY (Annualized Yield). The community also accused Kamino of being "anti-competitive," similar to the barriers erected by traditional banks. 3. Broader Context: Market Competition and Ecosystem Pressure: Solana's lending market has a TVL of approximately $5 billion (far lower than Ethereum's $50 billion), and liquidity is tight (TVL has continued to decline since the October crash). Coupled with the rug pull incident, users are sensitive to security. Kamino has long dominated (TVL exceeding $2.3 billion), while Jupiter Lend, as a newcomer, is rapidly eroding its market share (from 0 to $1 billion), raising concerns about a "vampire attack." External Impacts: Tushar Jain, a partner at Multicoin Capital (an investor in Kamino), called Jupiter “incompetent or malicious,” escalating tensions; Fluid (the Jupiter Lend backend provider) also joined the defense. II. Timeline III. Impact and Outlook For users: Short-term inconvenience (e.g., migration barriers), but a reminder about DYOR (research it yourself). It is recommended to diversify liquidity and avoid relying on a single protocol.

• For the ecosystem: Exposing Solana DeFi's "growing pains"—rapid innovation, but governance reliant on social reputation. The foundation hopes to use this to promote clearer risk standards and seize market share from Ethereum/TradFi.

• Who "won"? Currently a tie: Kamino strengthens its "security" image (KMNO up 2.5%), while Jupiter fights back with growth and product iteration (such as high APY) (JUP rebounds 5%). In the long run, this may foster better protocols, but continued infighting will scare away institutional funds.

This dispute is a microcosm of Solana's "high growth, low maturity": fierce competition, but more collaboration is needed.