Increasing value of currency promotes hoarding, when in fact, bit coin should be promoting spending. If everyone's intention is to buy and hold bit coins,they are useless as currency and become a speculative asset.
I get bit coin, I think it's interesting and useful as an alternative currency. But any hope that it is going to upend USD in any meaningful way is wasted. Dollars are far, far ahead in value, convenience and redeemability. And I don't see that changing anytime soon- at least not soon enough to get in on the speculation.
There's been a fair amount of cashing out the last few weeks, which has the effect of transferring coins from pre-existing large hoards to new, smaller hoards. That's a good thing overall, I think.
The next step is to get those smaller hoards spending, that's the trick.