Dear Beldians,
We are excited to announce that the most-awaited POS hardfork update is only a few days away!
Beldex is rolling out its POS hard fork at block height 742421. With the current blocktime, Beldex network is expected to undergo a hard fork (approx) at 6 PM UTC on Dec 10, 2021. This fork will transition the network from a Proof of Work to a Proof of Stake consensus algorithm.
What is Proof of Stake (PoS)?
PoS or Proof of Stake is a consensus mechanism based on the stake one holds within the network. Contrary to Proof of Work which relies on the “work” (computation of a mathematical puzzle to verify a block) done by miners, Proof of Stake relies on the stake they hold within the network to validate blocks.
Why transition to Proof of Stake (PoS)?
Proof of Work is used by many blockchain networks including Bitcoin, but it hasn’t been very efficient. Miners compete with each other to mine blocks. As the network grows, more and more miners enter the race and the difficulty in mining or validating a block increases proportionally. Thus, the miner with the highest hash rate (mining power) within the network gets to validate blocks before others do. Moreover, hardware requirements (ASICs, GPUs) and power consumption of PoW networks are so huge that they’ve become an environmental concern. For example, every transaction on the Bitcoin network consumes as much as $100 USD in electricity.
It is for this reason that many blockchain networks, including Ethereum are transitioning from Proof of Work to Proof of Stake. In a POS based network, validators (the equivalent of miners) do not compete with each other, but rather, nominate others to verify blocks (to solve the puzzle). Since the consensus depends on one’s stake on the network, a wallet, validator collateral and a CPU is all you need to become a validator. This greatly reduces the carbon footprint of the network.
Bucephalus Hard Fork
The Bucephalus hard fork introduces major updates to the Beldex network, chief among them being a change in consensus, reduced blocktime, increased block rewards, and the subsequent launch of the Flash, a second layer on top of Beldex chain that enables near-instant transactions.
Features introduced by the Bucephalus hardfork:
Once PoS goes live, the Beldex network will be supported only by Masternodes as opposed to the current miner+masternode architecture. Additionally,
- Block time is reduced 4X from 120 seconds to 30 seconds.
- The block rewards will be increased 5X from 2 BDX to 10 BDX.
- The masternode operators will receive 6.25 BDX or 62.5%% of the new block rewards, with the remaining 37.5% allocated to governance. Thus, masternode passive rewards will increase by 212.5%
- Flash second layer instant transactions to be rolled out.
More masternodes mean a faster, scalable, and decentralized Beldex network. Thus, we ask the community to participate and help secure the network.
Note: Beldex masternode validators need to upgrade to the latest version of the network before the Bucephalus Hard Fork. Details of the upgrade will be provided in a separate announcement soon.
Privacy is our priority
