Ethereum and Solana are both in the early stages of reassessing how much new supply their networks create, according to an August 7 analysis from Galaxy Research. Lucas Tcheyan, Vice President at Galaxy Research, said both chains are evaluating whether their current token issuance policies still serve long-term network security and market health, with discussions centered on whether validator and staker rewards should be slowed, held steady, or increased.
The proposals under consideration would represent some of the most significant changes to either network's monetary policy in years, and both are far enough along to have concrete numbers attached rather than just conceptual debate.
Ethereum's EIP-8361 Could Halve Staking Yields
On Ethereum, proposal EIP-8361 would introduce a mechanism that scales the burning of validator rewards according to the total percentage of ETH staked on the network. Consensus-layer yields currently sit at roughly 2.6%, but under the proposal, that could fall to around 1.2% — effectively cutting in half what validators earn for securing the chain. In one scenario Galaxy modeled, if 50% of the ETH supply ends up staked, the mechanism would allow up to 100% of validator rewards at that margin to be burned outright. The change would phase in gradually over 18 months following a network upgrade, with implementation expected after the Glamsterdam upgrade in fall 2026 and its full effects likely not felt until 2028.
Related: Dormant Ethereum ICO Wallet Wakes After 11 Years, Sends ETH to Coinbase
Solana's Twin Proposals Target Emissions and Fees
Solana's changes are moving on two fronts. SIMD-0550 would double the network's annual disinflation rate from 15% to 30%, pulling forward the date SOL reaches its terminal inflation rate of 1.5% from 2032 to 2029 and removing an estimated 18.9 million SOL from future supply. A companion proposal, SIMD-0553, would overhaul how the network prices transactions, shifting from flat fees to a resource-based model that Galaxy estimates could push daily SOL burns from around 650 tokens today to somewhere between 7,500 and 9,000 tokens — a 12 to 14 times increase in the rate at which the network removes SOL from circulation. Both Solana proposals have already secured support from validators representing 15% of active stake, enough to advance them into formal discussion and voting.
Taken together, the proposals reflect a shift in how both ecosystems think about token supply now that years of steady issuance have left researchers questioning whether current schedules oversupply their native assets relative to what's needed to secure the networks. Neither change is finalized, but if adopted, they would mark a meaningful tightening of new supply for two of the largest smart-contract platforms just as institutional and retail attention on token economics has intensified.
