Staking economics

No-risk staking

A fixed 3% of every evaluation fee funds this pool's yield, plus a share of the stakeholder split on every funded payout. It's called no-risk because it genuinely carries none of a firm's payout obligations, this capital is never drawn on to cover a trader, so there's no scenario where it takes a loss from firm activity. The tradeoff is exactly what you'd expect: lower yield than backstop stakingBackstop stakingCapital voluntarily staked by outside investors as a firm's payout collateral, in exchange for yield. Drawn on only after a firm's own treasury and token reserve are exhausted., for lower risk.

Backstop staking

A fixed 8% of every evaluation fee funds this pool's premium, on top of its own share of the stakeholder split, plus daily $DPROP$DPROPThe protocol-wide token (not yet launched). Funded by a small slice of every evaluation fee across every firm. airdrop points, none of which the no-risk pool earns. In exchange, this capital is the real thing standing behind a firm's Tier-3 payout obligations (see Funded accounts & payouts): when a firm's own treasury and token reserve can't cover a payout, backstop stake is what gets drawn on, and a loss there is mutualized across every backstop staker in that pool, proportionally, not absorbed by the protocol.

Higher yield, real downside. This isn't a marketing tier above no-risk stakingNo-risk stakingA $FIRMA staking pool that never absorbs trader-payout losses, earning a smaller, steady yield in exchange for carrying no downside., it's a different financial instrument.

What protects backstop capital from a sudden run

Because this is real payout collateral, unstaking isn't instant even once your position matures:

• Cooldowns scale with firm health. A firm under stress has a longer mandatory cooldown before you can withdraw.
• Cooldowns scale with your position size. Holding a large share of the pool means a longer cooldown than holding a small one, specifically so one large holder can't empty a meaningful chunk of a firm's payout collateral in a single move.
• A daily cap limits total outflow. No more than a set share of the pool can leave across all stakers combined on any given day, regardless of how many withdrawal requests are queued.
• Withdrawals pause during an active firm-wide stress event, the same circuit breaker that throttles trader payouts also freezes backstop withdrawals until it clears.

None of this locks your capital forever, it bounds how fast it can move, specifically to stop a bank-run dynamic from ever draining a firm's actual payout capacity in one shot.

Yield is not an APR guarantee

Both pools' yield is a share of real evaluation fee revenue, it scales with how much a firm is actually selling relative to how much is staked, not a fixed promised rate. A quiet firm with a large staked pool yields less per staked dollar than a busy one. This is a real, variable return, not a locked-in number.

One more variable works in your favor at well-run firms: once a firm's treasury crosses its health thresholds, the no-risk staking leg and the $DPROP staking leg both take a share of the fee that would otherwise have gone to the already-full treasury. A Thriving firm pays its stakers a larger slice of each sale than a Growing one; How the treasury health split works explains the zones.