HSP-002 Program Update
TLDR
HSP-002 rewards were distributed to 32 validators on January 23rd, 2026.
-
100% of rewarded validators remain active, while the number of small validators and their staked NEAR increased by 58% and 47% between the date HSP-002 was released to the forums and January 28th, 2026, respectively.
-
The program was successful but the design is not sustainable
-
Snapshot based eligibility causes the set of qualifying validators to change materially over time, reducing predictability for participants.
-
Defining eligibility based on the 100 smallest validators does not materially affect stake weighted security thresholds.
-
Future programs should use adaptive, stake based eligibility thresholds that better align with network evolution and decentralization goals.
-
The list of HSP-002 eligible validators can be found here.
Background
In October 2025, a proposal was introduced to the House of Stake (HoS) to identify the 100 smallest validators by stake and award 150 NEAR to those among them that maintained at least 97% uptime between October 1st, 2025, and December 31st, 2025 (Q4 2025). This proposal was designed to offset infrastructure costs for small validators following the NEAR inflation reduction. The proposal was passed via HoS on November 13, 2025. Gauntlet was tasked with monitoring the program and providing economic analysis on its effectiveness to inform future program design.
Program Summary
Rewards for Q4 2025 were distributed on January 23rd, 2026. Payments were made to 32 validators, totalling 4,800 NEAR, based on eligibility criteria determined by MetaPool.
Following that criteria, the 32 eligible validators were determined as follows:
-
Identify the 100 smallest validators as of October 1, 2025
-
Filter the 100 smallest validators to those with at least 97% uptime
-
Exclude validators that already receive incentives from other NEAR Foundation, Linear Protocol, or Meta Pool programs
Program effectiveness can be evaluated in various ways, for example, retention of existing validators rewarded, and small validator growth. The former indicates that there is a correlation between the rewards program and churn prevention. The latter indicates a correlation between rewards and net new growth. From that perspective, the program has performed well:
-
100% Retention of existing validators: All 32 validators who received HSP-002 rewards remain active today (noting that 33 validators were eligible during the period, and one shut down operations before receiving any rewards).
-
64 net new “small validators: Between the date HSP-002 was shared to the forums and January 28th, 2026, there has been a net increase of 64 small validators. The staked amount for small validators has increased to 3.9M.
However, further analysis reveals other methods for gauging success and identifying opportunities to improve the campaign design and its efficacy.
Insights
The success of HSP-002 is measured by its effect on validator behavior and network decentralization following the distribution of incentives. The program was designed to support the continued participation and performance of small validators after the NEAR inflation reduction, with the goal of maintaining network decentralization. Specifically, this analysis addresses four key questions:
-
Was HSP-002 effective at retaining small validators?
-
Did HSP-002 contribute to attracting new small validators?
-
Is the incentive program design sustainable going forward?
-
Did HSP-002 materially affect network-level stake decentralization?
Effect of HSP-002 on Validator Retention
To assess the effectiveness of HSP-002 on small validator retention, outcomes for validators who received rewards are compared with those of similarly sized validators who did not qualify due to uptime requirements. Validators participating in other incentive programs operated by the NEAR Foundation, Linear Protocol, or Meta Pool are excluded from both groups to isolate the effect of HSP-002.
All 32 accounts that received HSP-002 rewards remain active validators on the NEAR network. This group demonstrates a high rate of validator retention and sustained performance following the distribution of incentives. Of these accounts, 28 have continued to meet the required uptime threshold during Q1 2026 to date. The three accounts that are no longer meeting the uptime requirement are listed below:
| Account ID | Uptime |
|---|---|
| alumlabs.poolv1.near | 76.1% |
| builddao.poolv1.near | 93.2% |
| stablelab.poolv1.near | 81.0% |
In contrast, a subset of the 100 smallest validators did not qualify for HSP-002 rewards due to insufficient uptime. After excluding validators participating in other incentive programs, 29 validators remained in this ineligible cohort. Among these 29 validators, 9 are no longer active NEAR validators (31% churn rate).
Taken together, these outcomes suggest that HSP-002 has been effective in retaining small validators that already demonstrated high uptime.
Effect of HSP-002 on Attracting New Small Validators
HSP-002 was proposed on October 10th, 2025, while rewards were distributed based on a validator snapshot taken on October 1st, 2025. Consequently, any validators that joined after the proposal was published were not eligible for Q4 rewards by design.
Consequently, effectiveness in attracting new participants is assessed by examining changes in the population of small NEAR validators between October 10th, 2025, and the present. For this analysis, small validators are defined as those staking less than 150K NEAR. This amount represents the cutoff used to determine the 100 smallest validators in the October 1st, 2025 snapshot.
The underlying hypothesis is that HSP-002 contributed to the creation of these new validators, who are participating in the network with the expectation of future rewards targeted at small validator retention.
| Date | Number of Small Validators | Staked NEAR from Small Validators |
|---|---|---|
| As of October 10th, 2025 | 110 | 8.3M |
| As of January 28th, 2026 | 174 | 12.2M |
The table above shows that the number of new small validators increased between the release of HSP-002 to the forums and January 28th, 2026, as did the stake from small validators.
These outcomes suggest that HSP-002 has been effective in attracting new small validators, alongside other broader network dynamics.
Incentive Program Design Sustainability
As illustrated in the previous section, HSP-002 has helped attract new small validators. However, attracting these new validators has altered the underlying stake distribution of the 100 smallest validators. Of the 32 accounts that qualified for HSP-002 rewards as of October 1, 2025, only 15 would fall within the 100 smallest validators based on a January 1, 2026 snapshot.
The chart below illustrates the distribution of the 100 smallest validators at each snapshot, highlighting how the distribution of staked NEAR amongst the “smallest” validators has shifted over time.
The resulting shift in stake distribution also exposes a limitation of the snapshot-based eligibility design. While this approach effectively targeted small validators at inception, the program’s design becomes less sustainable over time as changes in the validator set and stake distribution shift the program’s definition of 100 smallest validators. In particular, validators that qualified as small in earlier snapshots may lose eligibility in later periods despite no material change in their own stake or performance. As new entrants shift the lower tail, rewards are effectively reallocated away from previously eligible validators, even though their infrastructure costs and NEAR stake remain largely unchanged. This dynamic introduces uncertainty for participants and raises concerns about the sustainability of HSP-002 as a long running incentive program.
Small Validators Impact on Decentralization
One objective of HSP-002 is to support small validators in order to preserve network decentralization. To evaluate whether small validators materially affect decentralization, this analysis examines their impact on stake-weighted control thresholds relevant to network security.
For each epoch, the minimum number of validators required to reach 33 percent and 66 percent of total stake is calculated, both with all validators included and with the smallest 100 validators excluded. These thresholds are commonly used to assess influence over consensus and network safety in proof-of-stake systems.
The chart below shows the number of validators required to control 33% and 66% of stake, with and without the smallest 100 validators, at each epoch. Across all epochs, excluding the smallest 100 validators has little to no effect on these thresholds. At the 33 percent threshold, the number of required validators is typically unchanged and occasionally reduced by one. At the 66 percent threshold, the difference is similarly limited to at most one validator, with many epochs showing no difference at all.
These results indicate that, as with most major staking networks, NEAR’s stake-weighted security is primarily determined by a relatively small group of large-sized validators. While small validators increase overall participation and validator count, they do not collectively control enough stake to materially influence key control thresholds.
Programs designed to support small validators should be understood as long-term investments in decentralization rather than mechanisms for an immediate boost to network security. The short-term benefits of such programs include validator retention, ecosystem participation, and NEAR’s international brand adoption. The extent to which small validator growth should be prioritized is therefore a governance decision, recognizing this approach as investment-driven rather than a traditional ROI driven campaign.
Takeaways and Next Steps
HSP-002 results indicate that the program was effective at maintaining and growing small validators on NEAR.
-
All 32 validators who received HSP-002 rewards continue to validate the network today. 91% of these validators have maintained the required uptime used in rewards eligibility through January 28th, 2026.
-
The number of small validators and their corresponding stake has increased since the proposal was initially shared to the forums, despite the inflation reduction. The number of small validators has increased from 110 to 174 validators (58% increase). The associated stake for small validators has increased from 8.3M to 12.2M (47% increase).
-
The total number of active validators increased from 296 on October 1st, 2025 to 396 at the end of Q4 2025. Validator location data is self reported and available for approximately 30% of active validators through the NEARBlocks API; within this reporting subset, no single country code accounts for more than 10 validators.
Fundamentally, and informed by other staking network designs, a program for growing validator spread should be considered for renewal. However, the current incentive design is not sustainable and should be revised to better align with evolving network conditions:
-
Snapshot-based eligibility tied to the 100 smallest validators does not remain stable over time. On October 1, 2025, a validator could have up to ~150K NEAR and fall within the bottom 100. By January 1, 2026, that threshold had dropped to 69K NEAR.
- Ongoing changes in the stake distribution cause the set of eligible validators to shift materially even when individual validator stake and performance remain unchanged, reducing predictability and long-term alignment with the program’s definition of “small.”
-
The 100 smallest validators have a limited impact on stake-weighted network security. Across all epochs between October 1st 2025, and January 28th, 2026, excluding the smallest 100 validators, changes the number of validators required to reach 33% or 66% of total stake by at most one validator, with the thresholds remaining unchanged in the majority of epochs. The definition of “small” should therefore be calibrated to a group of validators that collectively controls sufficient stake to meaningfully influence these control thresholds.
Along with Metapool and the NEAR Foundation, Gauntlet will continue to investigate to inform the next program.
-
Further discussions will be conducted to consider replacing the snapshot based eligibility model with a stake based threshold, with further analysis required to determine the appropriate cutoff.
- Define a threshold that identifies validators which are individually small but collectively influence the 33rd and 66th percentile control boundaries.