Inside Keel: Solana’s New Liquidity Layer for Credit, RWAs, & Stablecoins

In this episode of The Smart Economy Podcast, host Dylan Grabowski sits down with Cian Breathnach, founder of Matariki Labs and contributor to Keel, to explore how Solana is maturing into a high-performance environment for institutional capital, stablecoin liquidity, and tokenized real-world assets.

Breathnach shares his path from actuary to protocol engineer, reflecting on how Solana's speed, low fees, and composability convinced him to leave traditional finance and build full-time in Web3. He explains how Keel emerged from the Sky (formerly MakerDAO) ecosystem, why a “capital engine” is essential for scaling USDS adoption, and how capital allocation works inside a protocol-owned balance sheet.

The conversation covers the structural differences between fiat-backed, algorithmic, and overcollateralized stablecoins; the growing institutional interest in tokenization; and the importance of building on a monolithic chain where high-frequency execution and settlement happen in the same place.

Breathnach also unpacks the long-term vision behind Keel’s $2.5B capital roadmap, how it plans to grow lending markets and stablecoin liquidity on Solana, and what’s required to safely onboard institutional RWAs while navigating the realities of DeFi risk.

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