Yes, the price is more than a little steep. The market understands the potential of XCN and, as with Monero, places a premium on such disruptive innovation's unholy amounts of potential.
Sorry, but the mini-blockchain is not really a holy grail innovation. As said already, it is solving a "problem" many consider a non-problem. Furthermore, this idea has been in the air (= discussed at length) for a looooong time already.
So I don't think it is fair to put it at the same level as the cryptonote protocole which came by surprise in 2014 and is pretty much the only ground-breaking tech we've seen since bitcoin.
(I love to tell people that in terms of disruption, bitcoin is the only thing like internet since internet; now I got a new line: cryptonote is the only thing like bitcoin since bitcoin).