Exploring Galaxy Research’s Innovative Approach to Solana Inflation Governance
In a strategic move to enhance Solana’s governance framework, Galaxy Research has introduced a groundbreaking proposal designed to overcome the stalemate experienced in the previous SIMD-228 vote regarding inflation adjustments. This proposal, detailed on GitHub on April 17 under the title “Multiple Election Stake-Weight Aggregation (MESA) Vote for Reducing Inflation,” presents a novel voting mechanism that allows validators to express a wider range of preferences beyond the traditional YES/NO/ABSTAIN options currently available in Solana referenda.
Revisiting Solana’s Inflation Strategy After Initial Setbacks
Solana’s current monetary framework is rigidly defined: annual inflation starts at 8%, decreases by 15% annually, and stabilizes at a 1.5% “terminal” rate. According to data from Solana Compass, the effective inflation rate of the network stands at 4.591%. While the SIMD-228 vote showed a consensus recognizing these rates as a form of “security overpayment,” it failed to secure the necessary two-thirds supermajority to enact changes.
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Galaxy’s newly proposed strategy retains this familiar inflation reduction trajectory towards 1.5% but introduces a market-driven aggregation approach for voting. The authors suggest that instead of trying to achieve consensus on individual proposals, it would be more efficient to gather input from each stakeholder and determine an aggregate preference. Under the MESA proposal, validators could distribute their stakes across multiple YES accounts, each representing different disinflation rates, such as 15%, 17.5%, and 20%, while NO and ABSTAIN options remain unchanged. The weighted average of these YES options would then establish the new inflation rate. An illustrative example shows how distributing 5% of YES stake for “unchanged,” 50% for 30% deflation, and 45% for 33% would create a composite rate of 30.6%.
Galaxy emphasizes that this method should not be mistaken for a market-driven curve as described in SIMD-228, since the chosen schedule would still be deterministic. However, the firm believes this approach is more “democratic and progressive,” potentially eliminating the need for repeated single-outcome voting to find an acceptable inflation rate.
Community Feedback and Ongoing Discussions
The proposal has sparked significant discussion among core developers. Max Resnick from Anza highlighted potential issues on GitHub, cautioning that the averaging method might encourage strategic voting rather than honest preferences. He suggests that selecting the median of submitted preferences could offer a more truthful aggregation and reiterates his support for a dynamic, market-based approach to inflation over a fixed curve. Resnick expresses confidence in the Solana community’s ability to comprehend a dynamic inflation policy.
Galaxy’s authors acknowledge that some implementation details are still under discussion. They invite further debate on the number of YES buckets to include, whether SIMD-228’s 33% quorum and two-thirds supermajority thresholds should be retained, and if a weighted average is indeed the fairest method for consolidating the vote.
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