I really don't think the upvote bots have anything to do with it. In any transaction, one party buys what the other sells. Prices go up when demand is higher than supply. That's not caused by people sending SBDs to bid bots, because there's not even a trade involved there, it's rather like a "gift" where wallet X sends SBDs to wallet Y.

What really drives prices up or down, are the external markets. Because the SBD market cap is quite small, and so is its trade volume, any whale is able to pump its price by simply buying all open sell orders on an exchange. If you have a look at the current SBD sell positions of SBD on Bittrex, then you'll find it only takes a few million USD to buy all open sell orders, which will cause a gigantic price lift, which will trigger other bots to further increase its market cap.

And if you would read my article ( https://steemit.com/steemit/@scipio/how-sbd-could-replace-btc-an-unconventional-yet-possible-scenario ) and the comments underneath, you'll get my point on what's really happening in reality, regardless of the original intentions with SBD to be USD pegged.