Four

Tesla

Aptos

Token

Most <a href="https://www.thestreet.com/crypto/tag/blockchain" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">blockchains</a> pay for security by printing new tokens. Validators, the operators who run the network’s computers and confirm transactions, earn freshly issued coins as a reward.&nbsp;
That keeps the network running, but it also steadily dilutes everyone who already holds the token.
Aptos, a layer-1 blockchain built by former <a href="https://www.thestreet.com/crypto/tag/meta" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">Meta</a> engineers and live since October 2022, spent early 2026 trying to break that habit.&nbsp;
According to a <a href="https://app.blockworks.com/report/Aptos-tokenomics-path-to-deflation" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">new report from Blockworks Research</a>, pub. October 20 and funded by the <a href="https://www.thestreet.com/crypto/tag/aptos-foundation" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">Aptos Foundation</a>, those changes have put its <a href="https://www.thestreet.com/crypto/markets/aptos-ends-four-year-token-unlocks-as-monthly-releases-drop-60" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">APT token</a> on a credible path toward deflation.&nbsp;
Deflation here means more tokens get destroyed than created.
<a href="https://www.thestreet.com/crypto/markets/jpmorgans-31-year-old-report-embraces-once-mocked-asset" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">Related: JPMorgan’s 31-year-old report embraces once-mocked asset</a>
<h3 id="four-votes-in-four-weeks">Four votes in four weeks</h3>
Between Feb. 19 and March 19, APT holders approved four governance proposals.
The first capped APT’s total supply at 2.1 billion tokens. Supply currently sits at about 1.21 billion. The same proposal permanently locked 210 million Foundation and Community tokens, which can no longer be moved or unstaked.
Next, staking rewards were cut roughly in half, from 5.19% to a flat 2.6%. <a href="https://www.thestreet.com/crypto/tag/staking" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">Staking</a> means locking up tokens to help secure the network in exchange for rewards.&nbsp;
The cut reduced annual issuance from about 43 million APT to about 20 million.
<figure><img src="https://www.thestreet.com/.image/c_fit%2Ch_675%2Cw_1200/MjI3MDUyNzYxMzI0MjAwOTkx/screenshot-2026-10-21-at-122039am.png" height="675" width="1177">
 <figcaption>
 Source: <a href="https://app.blockworks.com/report/Aptos-tokenomics-path-to-deflation" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">Blockworks Research</a>
 </figcaption>
</figure>
Finally, Aptos raised gas fees, the small charges users pay to process transactions, about tenfold. The median fee went from roughly $0.00004 to $0.0003, which is still a fraction of a cent.
Put together, the report says, net supply growth fell about 70%, from roughly 5% a year to 1.5%.
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<h3 id="every-fee-goes-up-in-smoke">Every fee goes up in smoke</h3>
The fee change matters because Aptos has burned its gas fees since launch. Burning means those tokens are permanently removed from circulation.
Before the repricing, daily burns averaged about $242, which offset only around 0.2% of new issuance. Over the trailing 30 days, the report puts the daily burn at about $3,500, covering roughly 10% of issuance.&nbsp;
Blockworks credits about half of that improvement to the staking cut. It attributes the rest to APT’s lower price, which shrinks the dollar value of newly issued tokens.
Activity has helped too. Daily transactions rose from about 4.5 million in February to more than 12 million by June, then settled near 9 million in September.&nbsp;
<figure><img src="https://www.thestreet.com/.image/c_fit%2Ch_675%2Cw_1200/MjI3MDUyODQxMzE3OTY3NzU4/screenshot-2026-10-21-at-122539am.png" height="675" width="1177">
 <figcaption>Source: <a href="https://app.blockworks.com/report/Aptos-tokenomics-path-to-deflation" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">Blockworks Research</a>
 </figcaption>
</figure>
Much of that came from <a href="https://www.thestreet.com/crypto/tag/decibel" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">Decibel</a>, a perpetual futures exchange incubated by Aptos Labs.&nbsp;
<a href="https://www.thestreet.com/crypto/tag/perpetual-futures" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">Perpetual futures</a> are derivatives that let traders bet on price moves without an expiry date. The report says Decibel accounts for about 98% of Aptos transactions.
<h3 id="the-road-to-breakeven">The road to breakeven</h3>
Aptos isn’t deflationary yet. The report estimates the network would need about 10 times its current Decibel-style trading activity, roughly 1,050 transactions per second against today’s 105, for burns to match issuance.
The supply picture is also improving. Investor and team vesting wraps up this month, so yearly token unlocks drop from about 135 million APT to about 21 million.
<figure>
 <figcaption>Source: <a href="https://app.blockworks.com/report/Aptos-tokenomics-path-to-deflation" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">Blockworks Research</a>
 </figcaption>
</figure>
Using Token Holder Net Income, a Blockworks metric that measures what a network earns after paying its validators, Aptos came out at about +$4.21 per $10,000 of fully diluted value as of August.&nbsp;
<a href="https://www.thestreet.com/crypto/tag/solana" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">Solana</a> came in at +$0.15, <a href="https://www.thestreet.com/crypto/ethereum" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">Ethereum</a> at −$0.67 and Sui at −$5.67.
Whether Aptos actually reaches deflation now depends on traders showing up in far greater numbers.
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Aptos cuts APT supply growth by 70% after token overhaul, report finds

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