NEAR Protocol's HSP-029 Vote Seeks 2.5% to 1.6% Issuance Cut

HSP-029 Enters the Voting Stage

The tokenomics debate around NEAR Protocol (NEAR) has reached a formal decision point. HSP-029, a governance proposal published on the project’s official forum, now sits in the voting stage, and its subject is the supply schedule rather than a new feature. The draft would lower the network’s maximum annual issuance from 2.5% to 1.6%, phased in across 24 months, leaving the cap in transition for two full years. The figures behind the draft come from a model the proposer built on mainnet data as of September 22, 2026. On that model, new issuance would fall by 11.8 million NEAR over two years and by 66.1 million NEAR over six, though the document presents both numbers as projections, not as a confirmed supply reduction. The proposer is Sal Ternullo, chief executive of SVRN, and he disclosed his economic interest alongside the text. SVRN holds roughly 55 million NEAR, with more than 90% of that position staked, and Ternullo stated an intention to vote in favor. HSP-029 leaves the reward structure untouched: the existing 90:10 split between staking rewards and the treasury carries over unchanged, so what is being voted on is the size of the emission, not its division. The argument for the cut rests on dilution, holding that slower issuance protects holders who do not stake. The stated risk runs the other way, since smaller rewards could push some validator operations into difficulty. Forum discussion so far carries both positions, with support for a lower issuance standing alongside calls for clearer token demand and utility plans. The 24-month phasing matters for the model’s read: the lower ceiling arrives gradually, and yearly emission during the transition stays above the 1.6% final rate. A recorded vote result on the forum will be the only authoritative outcome; none has been published yet, so HSP-029 remains a request rather than a change.

NEAR at $4.37 Against Mixed Averages

COINOTAG’s live screen quoted NEAR Protocol (NEAR) at about $4.37 at 07:49 UTC on November 1, an intraday snapshot rather than a confirmed daily close. The quote sat below the 20-day simple moving average of $4.7496, the 20-day exponential of $4.6323 and the 50-day simple of $4.5601. The 50-day exponential, at $4.322, was beneath it, five of the eight moving averages on the screen sat below the price, and the MACD histogram read zero. A separate market reading showed $4.36 shortly after, though the two quotes lack a confirmed shared trading pair and cannot be read as one continuous move. Aggregate price history left the November 1 UTC close unmarked when checked. Daily spot records map the recent path: a 14.24% decline on October 29, a 5.84% gain on October 30 and a 3.26% rise on October 31. The full indicator set sits in our NEAR technical analysis, and our earlier coverage followed the slide into a key demand zone after that October drop. The demand case that supporters of the cut lean on was set out in the official NEAR Protocol blog of October 23. It recorded 17 independent chain signature operators taking part in the network, computation running inside trusted execution environments, and NEAR Protocol (NEAR) Intents, the protocol’s routing layer for swaps across cross-chain bridges, crossing $35 billion in cumulative volume. That volume figure covers the program’s entire cross-chain history, so it is a cumulative total, not a recent-run rate. Validators and liquid staking providers sit on the receiving side of that reward economy, which is why a lower emission cap touches their operating math directly. None of these figures changes the supply schedule; they describe the demand side the proposal’s backers cite when arguing the network can absorb a smaller reward pool.

Validator Sign-Off Still Pending

COINOTAG’s reading: the decisive distance here is the one between the forum and the mainnet. Passage of HSP-029 would not by itself lower emission, because validators would still need to adopt a separate protocol upgrade for the 1.6% cap to take effect, and no scheduled step beyond the vote is on the record. The proposal’s economics lean on the demand side its backers cite: $35 billion in cumulative Intents volume and 17 chain signature operators against thinner staking yield, a trade dissenting forum voices want proven before supply growth shrinks. Outside commentary has stayed constructive: our report covered Jamie Coutts’ bullish NEAR outlook from his October 28 post. Our earlier scenario work sees NEAR at $55-$95 by January 2027; the vote, and any upgrade that follows, will show which supply path the network actually takes.