The DFINITY Foundation recently released a new version of the ICP tokenomics white paper, with the main goal of significantly reducing token issuance while making the staking mechanism more aligned with common market practices.

Let's first look at the changes in NNS staking. The maximum lock-up period has been shortened from 8 years to 2 years, and the minimum lock-up period has been changed from half a year to 2 weeks — overall, giving participants more flexibility. The previous ultra-long-term lock-up APY of 13%+ has been canceled, replaced by short-term lock-ups that can yield 2-3% returns. Additionally, the maturity conversion mechanism has been adjusted with a clear logic: encouraging accumulation during bear markets and selling during bull markets.

Why make these changes? The main reason is that other mainstream tokens in the market are either fully liquid or have lock-up periods of no more than one week. No other token offers long-term lock-ups exceeding one year. Therefore, the previous ICP scheme was quite far from industry standards.

There are also adjustments on the node operator side. The reward scheme for first-generation old nodes was already not very reasonable, and this time it has been directly optimized. The distribution timing of node rewards has also been changed, again to incentivize "accumulating in bear markets and selling in bull markets."

What are the results? Overall, the new scheme will reduce token issuance by 44%. This means a significant easing of inflation pressure and a healthier environment for long-term ecosystem development.