Hi Luke, coming from an economics background, I've penned a post on the SBD peg - how it should have worked, why it is not working, how to get it working and whether we really want the peg.

You asked the question "Are pegged assets valuable?" IMO, the answer to that depends on whether users of the asset value its stability. If SBD is only meant to be a short-term asset, kind of like loose change in your pocket, and people convert SBD to other cryptos or Steem upon having enough of these small change, then the price of SBD does not actually matter that much. I'm only holding on to a small amount of SBD at any point in time, a fluctuation of 10% affects my $5 holding by a small amount.

Currently, the peg is broken and has been for a long time. Once people stop believing in a peg, there's no reason for it to hold anymore. There is nothing inevitable about the peg just because it's announced, but the platform is not willing to take costly and painful measures to defend it. Once nobody believes in the peg, it then becomes profitable for users to hold on to SBD as an investment for short-term gains if I think the price will rise in the future.

In short, maintaining a peg is not a cost-free measure. That's an idea that seems to have been missing in a lot of conversations about the peg.