It shouldn't have any affect on price. Everyone knows the drop will happen, so it's already factored in. (Imagine if we were bidding on a house and everyone knows there's gonna be a gold toilet installed tomorrow. Today's bids will reflect that.)
Exactly. It's public knowledge that the reward drop will happen late-november or early-december.
also note, that people have been mentioning a 'doubling' effect since the price was stable at $5. so in that case, it's already happened.