The inflation dispute of NEAR has finally reached the moment where the "vote button" needs to be pressed. Recently, the NEAR ecological governance institution House of Stake officially initiated voting on governance proposal HSP-029. This proposal, put forward by SVRN CEO Sal Ternullo, targets one of the most sensitive parameters at the protocol layer—the maximum annual token issuance rate: reducing it from the current approximately 2.5% to 1.6%. This will not be a one-time drastic change, but will initiate a 24-month linear decline after an approximately 90-day buffer period. On the surface, this is a technical adjustment bringing NEAR toward lower inflation and a more predictable supply path. In essence, however, it is a political game of how to redraw the line between "tightening issuance" and "network incentives": as issuance slows, long-term holders and the protocol's balance sheet become safer, but whether participants staking and building the network can still find an attractive position between returns and risks will become the real point of conflict behind this vote.

Two-Year Linear Deceleration: How NEAR's Inflation is Tightened

HSP-029 does not opt for a one-size-fits-all approach, instead introducing a buffer period of about 90 days. If the vote passes, during this time the protocol will continue to operate under the current maximum annual issuance rate of approximately 2.5%, with stakers and the treasury continuing to share earnings on a 90/10 basis. The existence of the buffer period serves as a notice to the entire network: funds can reassess their holding periods, validating nodes can prepare in advance for operational costs, future returns, and communication with delegators, instead of suddenly discovering during an epoch that their earnings curve has been rewritten in an instant.

The real inflation tightening begins after the buffer period ends, unfolding in a manner of 24 months of linear reductions: the maximum annual issuance rate will slowly slide from 2.5% to 1.6%, decreasing by approximately 3.75 basis points each epoch. This extremely fine scale design makes the change in issuance rate appear more like a continuous slight decrease rather than a one-time abrupt halt—avoiding severe earnings discrepancies for on-chain participants at a specific point in time and allowing the market sufficient time to reprice NEAR's supply and risk under the new path. More crucially, the entire process keeps the 90/10 earnings distribution structure intact: while the total issuance pool shrinks, the proportion of stakers and the treasury sharing the same pie remains unchanged, with the impact concentrated on "slowing the total amount" rather than "redistributing shares", thus the inflation tightening is wrapped in a set of execution rhythms that are as gentle as possible on the existing incentive structure.

Reduction of 66.1 Million Tokens: The Quantitative Impact of Supply Tightening

To quantify "total amount reduction," one can better appreciate the weight of this adjustment. According to a single source cited by panews from The Defiant, under the low-inflation path set by HSP-029, NEAR will issue approximately 11.8 million fewer tokens in the next two years; extended to six years, this shortfall expands to approximately 66.1 million tokens, leading to an estimated cumulative supply reduction of about 4.36% compared to maintaining the current issuance policy. This is not about abruptly tightening the issuance valve, but silently removing a segment of potential selling pressure under what appears to be a gentle linear deceleration, fundamentally changing the "baseline inventory" of on-chain assets years down the line.

For long-term investors, these figures will immediately be integrated into their models: 66.1 million fewer tokens over the next six years means an anticipated increase in marginal scarcity, starting to create narrative tension for an asset story with slower inflation. Even if the calculations are still only scenario analyses from a single source, they provide a clear dividing line at the moment of governance voting—supporting HSP-029 equates to betting on a more controllable supply and gentler inflation trajectory for NEAR; opposing it means accepting the original 2.5% path and its corresponding long-term inventory curve, and this dividing line will ultimately be reflected in distinctly different expectation structures regarding price and holding periods.

Staking Returns and Treasury Revenues: The Cost of Reducing Inflation

Under the current design, the new issuance of NEAR is almost entirely viewed as a "reward pool," distributed between stakers and the treasury at a 90/10 ratio. HSP-029 intends to reduce the "ceiling" of this entire pool: slowly pressuring it down from the current maximum annual issuance rate of about 2.5% to 1.6%. Given that variables such as staking participation rates and network usage are unknown, the brief did not provide any quantitative APY calculations, so we can only qualitatively describe the direction—when the overall available reward scale tends to tighten, each individual staker, under the same holding position and competitive environment, theoretically faces a lower nominal return. This inevitably raises a core question: can current and future network security still rely on "fewer rewards" to maintain the same level of custodial strength? If rewards are insufficient to cover node operational costs and opportunity costs, some validators and delegators might choose to reduce their staking scale or even exit, which would negatively impact the staking ratio and security margin; on the other hand, supporters' implicit assumption is that a lower inflation path itself can attract longer-term, more stable participants, thus maintaining or even optimizing the security structure under weakened incentives.

For the treasury, HSP-029 retains the 90/10 distribution structure, not altering the institutional ratio, but simply reducing the overall size of this "cake." The linear reduction will lead to a downward trend in the treasury's absolute income over many years, with scenario estimates indicating approximately 11.8 million fewer tokens in the next two years and around 66.1 million fewer tokens in six years, directly corresponding to a part of resources that may be absent due to funding constraints. Every token not received means that the ecosystem will need finer prioritization when funding projects, incentivizing developers, and absorbing infrastructure costs, and it also means governance must address a real issue: are we willing to exchange a tighter treasury budget for a more controllable supply and gentler inflation narrative in the long term?

House of Stake Voting: Deciding on Inflation Reduction

Now, HSP-029 has been pushed onto the voting board of House of Stake, the institution responsible for relevant governance votes, which is being asked for the first time to take a clear stance on NEAR's long-term issuance rhythm. Its boundary of authority in this inflation reduction battle is simple yet crucial: whether the plan can be implemented depends on whether it passes the vote in House of Stake according to the established process, not on silent adjustments made by a technical team or financial committee. In other words, whether NEAR is willing to use a linear reduction in issuance over the coming years, shifting the maximum annual issuance rate from approximately 2.5% to 1.6%, is not merely a model optimization issue, but an open political choice that requires "button confirmation" within the governance realm.

However, beneath the button, conflicts remain unresolved. In past years, every allocation corresponding to issuance has been viewed as ammunition for funding projects, rewarding developers, and maintaining infrastructure. Now these resources are quantified in the calculations as approximately 11.8 million fewer tokens in the next two years, 66.1 million fewer tokens in six years, and an estimated cumulative supply reduction of about 4.36%. Some participants have begun to worry that tightening the issuance path means the treasury and stakers will have to make tougher trade-offs on a leaner plate. On the other hand, some view this as an opportunity to "lock in the narrative": sacrificing some current expansion room in exchange for a gentler, more predictable inflation framework. The voting results have not yet been made public, and every vote from House of Stake toggling between these two narratives will determine whether NEAR continues to bet on high-intensity incentives or shifts to a more restrained route that emphasizes long-term supply discipline.

From High Inflation to Low Inflation: The Shift in NEAR's Narrative

If the past NEAR told a story of "high incentive-driven ecological expansion" with a maximum annual issuance rate of approximately 2.5%, then HSP-029 is attempting to rewrite the monetary narrative behind this main thread. The proposal lowers the target ceiling to 1.6% and after an approximately 90-day buffer, completes the transition with a 24-month linear reduction of about 3.75 basis points per epoch—not a sudden stop, but a rhythmic tightening of the throttle. According to existing estimates, under the new path, NEAR will issue approximately 11.8 million fewer tokens in the next two years and about 66.1 million fewer tokens in six years, leading to a cumulative supply reduction of approximately 4.36% compared to current policy, transforming "low inflation, gradually tightening supply" from an abstract slogan into a long-term commitment that can be quantitatively tracked.

In today's highly congested multichain competition, the logic of issuing one's own tokens is also a positioning choice. HSP-029 pushes NEAR onto a track that emphasizes predictable issuance and prudent increases, resonating with recent trends among some public chains that stress inflation control, and reserving new imaginative space for valuation frameworks: shifting the focus from merely discussing "how generous the rewards are" to being more concerned about the magnitude of passive dilution and the slope of the supply curve in the coming years. For those willing to hold long-term or participate in staking, such a regulated reduction path means they can decrease an important uncertain variable when modeling the value of NEAR. However, as of now, HSP-029 is still at the voting stage, and whether NEAR has truly transitioned from a narrative of "high inflation for growth" to "low inflation with discipline" will ultimately depend on the results of this governance vote.

The Long-Term Game of Low Inflation NEAR and the Pending Vote

HSP-029 has placed the contradictions on the table: on one side is the proposal to press the maximum annual issuance rate from the current approximately 2.5% down to 1.6%, locking in a more restrained and predictable supply path over 24 months after a 90-day buffer; on the other side is the implicit weakening of the existing incentive structure—while stakers and the treasury still share on a 90/10 basis, the current estimates indicate that approximately 66.1 million new NEAR tokens will be issued less over the next six years, which means a direct hedge between short-term returns and long-term scarcity. Inflation, incentives, and governance entangle into a game that has spanned multiple years: if the vote passes, the supply rhythm will be written into the protocol's timeline, and ecological participants will have to recalibrate their strategies and expectations under a framework of lower issuance; if rejected, NEAR will continue to pursue growth under a higher issuance rate, extending the narrative life of "using more issuance for more expansion." The key is that, as of now, the voting results, specific effective dates, and execution details remain undisclosed. This restructuring of NEAR's issuance order for the coming years has yet to be finalized, and the true answer can only gradually emerge in the upcoming rounds of governance progress.

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