The Security Council has until November 16 to exercise its veto. If implemented, the cut would reduce newly issued NEAR and could lower rewards for stakers and revenue for validator operators.
NEAR token holders approved HSP-029, a proposal to lower maximum annual token issuance from 2.5% to 1.6%. The House of Stake vote closed at 16:48 UTC on November 2, 2026. The platform records 36 voters and shows 99.96% support by voting power.
Holders backed the proposal put to a vote in October. The network has yet to start issuing tokens at the lower rate. The NEAR team said on November 2 that Security Council review and preparations must come first, followed by validators adopting the protocol upgrade.
Voting is over; the veto window remains open
According to the House of Stake timeline, the Security Council can veto the proposal on legal or technical grounds until 16:48 UTC on November 16. No veto had been recorded at the November 3 check, and ratification remained pending. If the council takes no action before the deadline, the proposal will be automatically ratified.
Support accounted for 99.96% of the voting power cast. That does not establish the proportion of all NEAR holders or individual voters who backed the proposal. House of Stake documentation explains that users lock eligible assets to receive veNEAR, non-transferable voting power that cannot be traded. Voting weight grows while the assets remain locked. Holders can vote directly or delegate their voting power.
The team plans roughly 90 days of preparation after ratification. Wallet providers, crypto exchanges, custodians and staking services would have time to update the information they give users. Protocol developers would prepare, test and release the software change. Validator operators would also need to adopt the software before the network could start applying the new rate. The reviewed sources do not specify a confirmed activation date, block height or release version.
Issuance would decline over 24 months
The approved proposal would lower the annual cap linearly over 24 months after activation. Moving from 2.5% to 1.6% is a reduction of 0.9 percentage points, or 36% relative to the starting rate. The software would lower the rate a little every epoch, a network accounting period. The months in the table mark points along that decline, not dates for individual cuts.
| Time after activation | Annual issuance cap |
|---|---|
| Start | 2.500% |
| Month 6 | 2.275% |
| Month 12 | 2.050% |
| Month 18 | 1.825% |
| Month 24 onward | 1.600% |
The cap limits new token creation; it does not deduct tokens from existing balances. The network would retain its allocation of 90% of issuance to staking participants and 10% to the treasury. The proposal creates no new fund, administrator or spending programme and does not redirect validator rewards to another purpose.
The author’s model projects about 11.8 million fewer NEAR issued over two years and 66.1 million fewer over six years than if the 2.5% cap stayed unchanged. The estimate covers tokens that would no longer be created; it does not count a burn of existing tokens. New tokens would add to total supply while burning transaction fees would reduce it. The net change would depend on both amounts.
Token buybacks funded by NEAR Intents revenue remain separate. HSP-029 does not govern the use of that revenue or distribution of purchased tokens. NEAR’s February 24 tokenomics explanation also distinguishes buybacks, staking and locking as different mechanisms, without guaranteeing that any particular mechanism or supply outcome will occur.
What changes for staking returns and validator revenue?
Lower issuance could reduce the NEAR-denominated rewards earned by people who stake. Using September 22, 2026 data, the proposal reports total supply of about 1.307 billion NEAR and 558.2 million staked, a staking ratio of 42.71%. Holding the staked share of supply constant, the author calculates an annual gross staking reward rate of 5.268% at the start and 3.372% at the final issuance cap. The calculation excludes validator commissions and does not guarantee future rewards at those rates.
A holder’s net reward depends on the chosen validator’s commission and the total amount staked across the network. After deducting an assumed 5% commission, the author calculates annual reward rates of approximately 5.00% and 3.20%, respectively. Token rewards also differ from dollar returns: changes in NEAR’s market price separately affect the money value of the investment.
Holders who do not stake receive none of the newly issued rewards. With other conditions unchanged, slower issuance would reduce the rate at which their share of total supply shrinks. Proposal author Sal Ternullo argues that the network no longer needs the high issuance used in its early years and that cutting rewards could reduce associated selling. The vote itself does not establish that market demand or the price will rise.
Validator operators would have to pay for servers and other operating expenses while earning less commission revenue. In the author’s separate cost model of 405 pools, the number able to cover expenses using their own token holdings and commissions falls from 170 to 146. It assumes a NEAR price of $4.30 and monthly costs of $500 for block producers or $200 for standard pools. The author excludes assets held in other accounts. The additional 24 pools that fail to cover costs in the model are not a forecast of 24 operators quitting.
The proposal author supplied the network data and cost calculations; KriptoMeta did not independently measure the chain. Ternullo discloses that he leads SVRN, which holds about 55 million NEAR and stakes more than 90% of its holdings. He also discloses that SVRN operates a multi-party computation (MPC) node and receives payments for that service under the separate HSP-007 arrangement. HSP-029 does not alter those payments.
The House of Stake team would publish quarterly reports comparing planned and actual issuance, validator health, the staking ratio and how many fewer tokens had been issued by that date than under the old 2.5% plan. The proposal has no trigger that automatically raises issuance again. If the network later considers 1.6% insufficient, a new governance proposal would have to be put to a public vote.
