Therefore, the only reason for it to be around is that on the internal market, it's never less than $1, and so those being paid in it can always get $1 there.

I am pretty sure that this isn't the case, as internal market is pretty well aligned with the externals - even when the price of HBD was 70 cents.

The only real benefit for me with HBD is I like seeing what kind of conversion I get - though, I do hope that one day one HBD buys 0.1 HIVE, rather than 7.