Tarun Chitra, Founder and CEO of Gauntlet, joins to discuss the evolving landscape of stablecoin yield and institutional adoption. As debate continues in Washington over who controls yield, banks or crypto firms. Chitra points to a rapidly growing parallel market: earn programs offered by Neobanks and fintech platforms outside the traditional banking system. With major asset managers like Apollo Global Management, Fidelity Investments, and Bitwise Asset Management signaling interest, he argues that stablecoin yield is becoming an increasingly attractive entry point for institutions seeking safer, more predictable returns in digital assets.
The conversation also explores how decentralized finance (DeFi) is reshaping lending by enabling instant, collateralized borrowing now extending beyond crypto-native assets to real-world assets like equities and real estate. Chitra explains how this shift could streamline traditional processes, offering seamless access to liquidity in ways legacy systems cannot. While crypto volatility has sidelined some speculative players, he notes that value-focused institutions remain engaged, drawn to sustainable yield opportunities rather than high-risk trends. The result, he suggests, is not a retreat from institutional adoption but a changing of the guard toward more stable, income-driven strategies in the digital asset space.
