Rhea LST (rNEAR, xRHEA)
Rhea LST is outside the current firm shelf because its receipts, rNEAR and xRHEA, exist only on NEAR, which this registry rejects on upgrade and exit control. Staking NEAR through Rhea adds a receipt-token contract on top of a chain whose protocol changes activate by client adoption and whose exit is an MPC-signed bridge.
- The Near verdict changes
- rNEAR gains material liquidity on a chain the registry approves
Watched nightly: a warning on its venues or files, or a cited document that changes, reopens the memo. The first confirmation is due 2027-03-22.
The research file
Mechanism and why the rule applies
Rhea offers ’stake $NEAR and receive $rNEAR’ and ’stake $RHEA and receive $xRHEA’, each ’while earning staking rewards’. Two pools held about $47M at review. rNEAR is a liquid-staking receipt on NEAR validators; xRHEA is a governance-token staking receipt whose return depends on RHEA emissions and price.
Control and incident boundary
Rhea points to an audits page in its developer guide; DefiLlama records two audits. The receipt contracts, the validator set they delegate to, and the RHEA token all sit on NEAR, so the chain grade’s upgrade and bridge findings apply in full.
Exit and current measurement
Unstaking NEAR follows the protocol’s epoch unbonding; xRHEA exits into RHEA, a thin governance token. Neither leaves NEAR without Omni Bridge.
Comparison and decision
The rejected-chain rule stops the analysis before receipt design or validator quality apply. Review reopens if NEAR passes the chain framework.
Class rule
The rejected chain class is outside the approved structures, so every protocol in it is not approved until the rule changes. The rule is about the structure, not an adverse finding about this protocol, and it is not a client instruction. The events that would reopen it are listed with the memo.
Sources
The claims above trace to these. Where a number could not be independently verified, the thesis says so.
- Rhea Finance — staking products · primary · accessed 2026-09-22
Supports: stake NEAR receive rNEAR, stake RHEA receive xRHEA, staking rewards - Rhea Finance developer guide — audits · primary · accessed 2026-09-22
Supports: published audits - DefiLlama — RHEA LST protocol data · secondary · accessed 2026-09-22
Supports: Liquid Staking category, Near only, reported TVL
Inherited controls
The research above describes the protocol layer. Every position also inherits the asset it holds and the chain it settles on. The layer with the most administrative power sets the position’s effective control; that describes control, not quality or suitability.
| Chain | Verdict | Control | Control constraint |
|---|---|---|---|
| NEAR Protocol | Rejected | Mixed control | upgrade authority sits with whoever cuts the nearcore release and the 100 block producers who adopt it; the bridge exit depends on an MPC set and Wormhole, not on NEAR consensus alone. |