Helium’s veHNT holders approved a capped supplemental mint of about 141 million Helium Network Tokens (HNT), setting a new funding schedule for the network while raising its effective supply ceiling.
Helium’s voting record shows 93.73% support and 6.26% opposition in the July 2, 2026, vote. The approved HIP 149 estimates the mint would lift HNT’s effective supply ceiling from about 206 million to 347 million.
The plan calls for about 70.6 million HNT to be issued at a flat rate for roughly 12 months. An approximately equal amount would then be released over 24 months as issuance declines linearly to zero. The program is designed to end automatically.
Nova Labs, Inc. would administer a vault holding the supplemental tokens. The proposal lists carrier expansion, deployer programs, engineering and operating costs among its intended uses; the funds would not go to on-chain Hotspot rewards.
Five council seats are reserved for community-nominated candidates confirmed by a veHNT-weighted vote, while Nova appoints the other two members. The five community-selected members would share 1.25% of the supplement, estimated in the HIP at about 1.76 million HNT. The council would have access to category-level financial information and publish quarterly reports on vault outflows. It could escalate a recommendation to reduce, pause or end the mint for a community vote, with the community making the final decision.
HIP 149 says rewardable network data had grown about fourfold while HNT issuance stayed fixed and the token’s price fell by more than half. It also describes operations and growth funding as a year-to-year process without a built-in funding runway. The proposal says deployer earnings are disconnected from the rates carriers actually pay and proposes tying those earnings to the payer rate set by Nova. As precedent, it cites a roughly 2.9 million HNT supplement for the MOBILE treasury under HIP 138.
The mint is scheduled to begin 14 days after the seven-member council takes its seats. If delivery of the council’s review materials is delayed, the start is postponed by the corresponding delay.
