Yes. This is already happening to a small extent, and the use of bitcoin as a money transfer mechanism is where the value comes from. People who wish to transfer money using bitcoin do not care about the market price; if they have $1000 USD to send, they buy $1000 USD worth of bitcoins at market price, send them over the network in seconds, and then that value is converted into cash locally. They don't care about the market price, as long as it isn't volatile over the short time it takes to move the value.

The market price of bitcoin is determined by the number of bitcoin holders who think they will go down in value; as coins gradually transfer to the hands of people who believe they hold long term promise, the market price of 'loose change' available for transfer will rise; that rise in price will actually _increase_ the use of btc as a transfer mechanism because it will attract more people seeing BTC as a store of value, which increases the store of bitcoins held for long term positions and thus the market price of BTC, etc. The increase of its usage as a medium of transfer ALSO increases the market price of BTC; that interplay between new value-minded long term investors and new users of btc as a transfer mechanism is what has been pushing the price up continually. the entrance and exit of speculators in the market is a short term distraction that has the benefit of spreading awareness but the drawback of adding to conception as a bubble.

after about the 6th or 7th one of these 'boom and bust' cycles that triples/quadruples the market price, people will stop seeing this as a 'maybe' thing, and my guess is that will drive a massive one-time spike in the value.