Exact Contraction Rates via the Berkson--Porta Representation: A Sharp Threshold and Its Herglotz-Kernel Obstruction

Abstract

Semigroups of holomorphic self-maps of the unit disc with an interior fixed point are, by the classical Berkson--Porta representation, entirely determined by a single holomorphic function constrained only by a positivity condition on its real part. This paper uses that representation to determine exactly when the associated flow contracts the Kobayashi metric of the disc at its best possible rate --- the rate dictated by linearization at the fixed point --- rather than at some smaller, conservative rate of the kind ordinarily obtained through auxiliary metric constructions. The question is reduced to a single pointwise inequality on the representing function, and this inequality is resolved completely for a natural one-parameter family of nonlinearities, yielding an exact threshold rather than a sufficient condition of undetermined tightness. Beyond this family, an explicit representing function is exhibited for which the inequality fails almost everywhere on the disc, and the Herglotz integral representation underlying the associated Carathéodory class is used to trace this failure to concentration of the representing measure, explaining rather than merely documenting why no threshold-free general theorem is available. The results are illustrated by direct numerical verification of the sharp threshold and of the explicit obstruction, and the paper closes by identifying the precise class of representing measures --- point masses and their neighborhoods --- that any future general sufficient condition would need to exclude.