The Solana Foundation has made a significant update to its Delegation Program, announcing a policy aimed at increasing decentralization and fostering a self-sustaining validator ecosystem.
Under the new policy, for every new validator added to the Solana Foundation Delegation Program (SFDP), three existing validators will be removed from the program, provided they meet certain criteria. These include having been part of the program for at least 18 months and having less than 1,000 SOL in external staked assets outside of Foundation support. This means validators who have been in the program for a long time and have low assets will be replaced on an ongoing basis.
Ben Hawkins, Head of Staking Ecosystem at the Solana Foundation, explained the reasoning behind the change in detail:
“As part of our ongoing commitment to decentralization and long-term network health, the Solana Foundation will implement a new policy regarding validator recruitment and cancellation of the Delegation Program.”
The new rules will go into effect immediately. According to Hawkins, the initiative serves three main purposes:
- Reducing over-reliance on Foundation staking power by reducing central points of influence.
- Rewarding community-supported validators, especially those who manage to attract independent delegates.
- To increase decentralization and efficiency by providing a more flexible and robust network infrastructure.
*This is not investment advice.
