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Dash is no competition to Monero. We know that.
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Disagree. It is competition, and strong competition at that. It is not as good, on paper, but nevertheless is winning in the marketplace, for now...
I should clarify that I meant Dash is "no competition"
in any of the markets or use cases where fungibility/privacy actually mattersThat is probably most/best represented as the darknet markets, which is nothing to sneeze at as so-called "System D" economies are abso-frikkin-lutely HUGE. But it's not only DMN's as we-here around this forum well know: FUNGIBILITY MATTERS to just NORMAL PEOPLE too, much more than almost everyone realizes!!!
Anyway, the DNM operators who matter have already pretty clearly said they will not ever TOUCH Dash. IMHO this is probably the primary reason why the Dashers finally decided to stop trying to compete with Monero on fungibility/privacy and instead they decided to pivot to this "ease of use" and gov't compliance posture instead.
As you said earlier it is Bitcoin they are after.
Hubris, yes - but they just popped over $100 and reached about 3 quarters of a billion USD market cap.
BTC dominance in market cap now at 78.7% - so (since BTC is not dropping) new money is coming in and it's going into alts.
Tempted by 30% a DAY rises perhaps...
Go figure. It is NOT sustainable.