Binance pool launches Bellscoin (BEL) merged mining with LTC and DOGE

Bellscoin (BEL) will become a part of the Binance pool portfolio. The asset is not yet traded on the exchange, but will be produced as a reward for merged mining on the Litecoin (LTC) network. 

Bellscoin (BEL) expanded its presence as a new merged mining asset on the Litecoin network. As of September 30, Binance Pool will reward the BELL produced in each Litecoin block to all the pool’s clients. 

To gain the BEL rewards, miners need to join Binance pool with their Scrypt mining operations. The BEL will be sent to an external wallet, as the asset is still not listed on Binance. There are also no immediate plans for listing BEL. 

BEL is also attractive due to its relatively scarce supply. The self-reported supply is just 42M, and will rise to 58M at the end of the year. Afterward, new token production will slow down following the Epoch 5 cutoff date. BEL production will have a fixed 2 BEL per block reward every minute, and will slowly reach a supply of 60M coins by 2026. The opportunity for rapid mining and bigger rewards in 2023 and 2024 was the chief reason for fast miner onboarding. 

Bellscoin mixes meme message with classic mining

Bellscoin may benefit miners with significant Scrypt hashing power. Scrypt mining never slowed down, boosted by the relative stability of LTC, as well as the additional production of DOGE. Bellscoin was first launched as a mined project in 2013, and was revived as a new version, with merged mining, in 2023. 

The coin’s creator is one of the co-founders of Dogecoin. Known as Shibetoshi Nakamoto or Billy Markus, the creator has not exclusively shilled the asset. BEL aims to grow organically, while possibly adding ordinals or other community-based projects. The Bellscoin website reminds users that the BEL asset has nothing to do with Nintendo or Animal Crossing, and has no intrinsic value or project associations. 

Merged mining requires a self-custodial wallet and a Binance account. The BEL assets will be added to the wallet, once it is configured for Binance’s mining pool. Without configuring the wallet, participants will not be able to receive their BEL rewards. The merged mining is only open to fully verified Binance users. Anonymous BEL mining is only available through solo machines or through pools with different terms and conditions.

The amount of BEL mined will depend on the pool’s performance, and will not depend on the proportion of LTC or DOGE produced in their respective blocks. All BEL miners through the Binance Pool will receive payouts of a minimum of 1 BEL. As of September 30, Bellscoin has 36 more days to go to complete Epoch 3, part of its accelerated mining schedule. 

After six more months, Bellscoin will switch from its generous rewards for top producers to a flat block reward. All Bellscoin blocks will produce 2 BEL every minute. 

BEL trades close to all-time high

A day before Binance’s announcement, BEL rallied to an all-time high above $1. The asset has been expanding for the past few weeks, to reach an all-time peak of $1.03. Later, BEL slid to $0.94.

BEL relies mostly on CoinEx and other small-scale exchanges. The project relies on the community to call on exchanges. However, the attention from Binance had an immediate effect on the token’s attention.

One of the reasons for the renewed hype is that Binance often adds coins and tokens to its side projects before considering a listing. Additionally, BEL corresponds to Binance’s latest criteria on listing new assets, as it has a fair distribution with no pre-mine. 

Despite this, BEL has a relatively hard barrier to entry for miners. The largest pools have already monopolized the Scrypt hashrate, with ViaBTC producing more than 32% of all Litecoin blocks. 

The addition of BEL to Binance Pool may boost its Scrypt activity, as all newcomers must mine LTC. Binance Pool has a relatively small share of the Litecoin Scrypt hashrate, bringing together 6,827 miners. The pool discovers a new block every few hours for LTC and DOGE, compared to a block every few minutes for larger miners. 

The recent addition of BEL keeps boosting the Litecoin hashrate to an all-time high. Since April 2024, the hashrate is up by 20%, to 1.2 PH/s. Bellscoin thus inherits the extremely safe network, offering a mix of a relatively cheap new asset with additional security.

LTC stabilized at $68.10, for now failing to rally to a higher range after its latest halving in 2023. DOGE recovered to $0.12, still making up a large portion of the meme token market. 

Cryptopolitan reporting by Hristina Vasileva

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