RE: Is it just me, or has my voting power increased significantly during these last few days?
Steem has been rising too, albeit lot less compared to SBD. My impression was that SBD was tied to the US dollar, and Steem was the one that was supposed to have the unchained price. How wrong was I.
I do understand however why Steem isn't going to the moon anytime soon. It is basically an unlimited currency, it has no upper limit. That is going to relax and dampen lot of the turbulence in its price, as will tying it into Steem Power. Steem Power, and especially the way powering down is restricted to small chunks every few weeks is the one reason why Steem price doesn't plummet overnight. It can't be cashed out immediately.
I am fairly certain Steem can't rise very high if it does value in time, or that its valuation will be a very slooow process. And that in part has affected the valuation of SBD. Because SBD is clearly more liquid currency, it can be traded with, and with enough cash, it can be manipulated.
I think it may very well be a pump-and-dump scene we are witnessing here.
It wouldn't cross my mind to start hoarding SDB inspite of it being tradable even on some cryptocurrency exchanges.
You are right, I see SBD also as the liquid Steem. Could be that therefore it was traded much stronger than Steem.
I thought that the introduction of Smart Media Token might caused this delayed attention into SBD and the rise. Who knows. :-) Maybe it is as you said just pump-and-dump.