NEAR Protocol Governance Approves Proposal to Cut Annual Token Issuance Cap by 36%

NEAR Protocol’s House of Stake governance body approved proposal HSP-029 on November 2, with about 99.96% support and 3.29 million veNEAR votes. According to Odaily, the proposal would gradually lower the annual token issuance cap from 2.5% to 1.6% over 24 months, at an average rate of 0.0375 percentage points per month. The proposal was submitted by Sal Ternullo, CEO of Nasdaq-listed SVRN, and changes only one protocol parameter. The existing allocation would remain unchanged, with 90% of newly issued tokens going to staking participants and 10% to the treasury. Implementation requires approval from the House of Stake Security Committee, an approximately 90-day preparation period, and a protocol upgrade by validators. Model estimates indicate that, compared with the original cap, the change would reduce issuance by about 11.8 million NEAR in the first two years and 66.1 million over six years. Once fully implemented, daily issuance is estimated to fall from about 89,500 NEAR to 57,300. Assuming a similar staking participation rate, gross staking yield is projected to decline from 5.268% to 3.372%, while validator commission revenue is estimated to fall by 36%.