Beam (BEAM) briefly reached high volumes all-time in the past few days while trading at $0.03. BEAM drew attention with a rally that went against the market trend. The asset saw its most active day since the November relaunch.
The developers decided to rebrand the current BEAM token from Merit Circle (MC), an older project that caused skepticism. The new BEAM token inherits both the positives and the negatives from Merit Circle and aims to draw in builders again.
BEAM traded at $0.028 after a slide in the past day. Trading volumes returned to around $31M in 24 hours, down from a peak above $215M. BEAM is highly reactive to pumps, as more than 43% of its volume is centralized in one Binance trading pair.
BEAM has more than 49B tokens in circulation out of 62.43B tokens. Based on renewed activity, short-term price predictions see BEAM attempting $0.10 price levels. More optimistic price predictions allow for a hike as high as $1.
BEAM retreated soon after the rally, which caused predictions of a further rise to a higher range. However, investors approached the asset with some skepticism because of Merit Circle’s history. In the past, Merit Circle went through a boom and bust cycle after launching.
Before the final swap date, MC tokens will have vestigial trading, reflecting the BEAM market price multiplied by 1,000. MC tokens have limited swapping opportunities, with most activity happening through Uniswap pairs.
Beam Aims for Better Token Visibility
More than 79% of BEAM tokens are in circulation, with some held in the former treasury of Merit Circle. Even locked Merit Circle rewards were released for swapping. Some of the old MC tokens may also be abandoned, as the swapping mechanism requires significant fees.
Most BEAM is held in personal wallets or decentralized protocols. Around 10B tokens are available on centralized exchanges, with the largest share on Binance.
Beam is still in its growth stage compared to other networks. A total of just 6,128 unique wallets used the migration contract. After the migration, additional BEAM buying distributed the token to more than 31K wallets.
Around 25% of the token supply is also locked in the top address, which has fewer than 300 transactions and has the capacity to alter market conditions with its token haul.
Beam Network Chases Web3 Gaming Growth
Beam’s focus remains Web3 and gaming, with attempts to draw in new projects and build metaverse land plots. Beam now aims to grow its list of native games. The project also works to recover from the lawsuit against Yield Guild Games, where the Merit Cirle community decided to buy out the YGG initial investment and continue as an independent gaming community.
Most games on Beam are still in the early building stages. Promised titles include early releases like Dremica, which are now gathering players. The Beam community is also involved in large-scale games like Axie Infinity, Illuvium Arena and Genopets.
Since the end of 2023, Beam partnered with Polygon and Immutable, two of the most active Layer 2 solutions for gaming. The potential for partnerships is helping the new Beam brand. The BEAM asset now aims for a multi-chain presence. Besides being active on Ethereum, Beam is one of the main subnets on the Avalanche blockchain, which was launched less than a year ago.
Also read: Avalanche (AVAX) Decreases Staking Requirements to Build New Subnets
To boost volumes and influence, Beam also added a native decentralized exchange. Beam DEX is the main store of value, carrying around $4.69M in liquidity. For now, BEAM remains one of the more centralized tokens, awaiting the revival of interest for gaming assets.
Cryptopolitan reporting by Hristina Vasileva
