SIP-6: Establish Validator Bonding Requirements

Governance
1

Abstract

This proposal establishes the baseline bonding requirement for Superform validators.

If approved, new validators must maintain a minimum validator bond of 1,000,000 staked UP (sUP) to participate in the SuperVaults validator network.

Background

SuperVaults rely on validators to provide independently observed, quorum-backed, price-per-share (PPS) updates across chains.

As SuperVaults expand into institutional vault infrastructure, validators become a core part of the system’s credibility. Validators participate in OCR2 consensus, sign PPS reports, and help keep vault accounting verifiable.

The validator program is currently permissioned. New validators are expected to complete Superform onboarding, including KYB and associated KYC for relevant control persons or operators, as applicable. You can learn more about this process here: Become a SuperVault Validator - Superform .

This proposal adds a clear governance-approved bonding requirement for validators.

Mechanism

New validators must maintain a minimum validator bond of 1,000,000 sUP.

Current:

  • Validator Bond: Not governance-defined

  • Bond Asset: Not governance-defined

  • Validator Onboarding: Permissioned

Proposed:

  • Validator Bond: 1,000,000 sUP minimum

  • Bond Asset: sUP

  • Validator Onboarding: Permissioned

To satisfy the requirement, a validator must deposit sufficient UP into the sUP staking vault to get 1,000,000 sUP and maintain the resulting position while participating in the validator set.

This proposal does not define validator rewards, slashing, or permissionless validator admission. Those may be addressed in future proposals.

Rationale

Requiring validators to hold a meaningful sUP bond aligns validators with the protocol they help secure.

Validators are not passive participants. They operate critical infrastructure, manage validator keys, participate in PPS consensus, and help protect the integrity of SuperVault accounting.

Holding the validator bond as sUP ensures validators are aligned with the same long-term governance participation layer as the rest of the ecosystem. It also removes the gap between being a validator and being a committed governance participant.

Voting Options

For

Approve a minimum validator bond of 1,000,000 sUP for new validators joining the SuperVaults validator network.

Against

Make no changes. Validator bonding requirements remain undefined by governance.

Abstain

Abstain from voting.

1 Like
2

Hi Superform team,
I support the general idea of introducing a clear validator bond for better alignment and institutional credibility.However, the proposed 1,000,000 sUP minimum self-bond (≈ $110–130k at current prices) is quite high. Such a large self-stake requirement is not common and is rarely used in most other projects.

There is only a real chance and benefit for professional validators if the Superform Foundation itself fully covers this amount (e.g. through delegation or co-staking) and these tokens remain locked with the validator.

1 Like
3

I would be supportive of a module that allows individual sUP stakers to delegate to larger entities. This is not something currently under development though, and at the moment would be best tackled by an entity on top of Superform (perhaps through an LST-like derivative).

The requirement of 1M sUP is a necessary economic protection in the early phases. If there is appropriate interest, I believe the Superform Foundation would be more than happy to promote that delegation process as a supplement to this SIP though.

4

For a large institutional partner, a 1M sUP bond may be reasonable. But for independent professional validators, agree with previous msg - locking ~$110–130k is realistically a very high barrier.

I was personally looking forward to the opportunity to validate for Superform, and I was happy to see in the announcement that professional node operators are considered good candidates. But a 1M self-bond without Foundation delegation or co-staking is not realistic for many independent operators at this stage -_-

It would be great if community validators had a real path to join the validator set in the future through Foundation or community delegation.