If that were true, doesn't it support my thesis even more the distribution is abnormally inequitable and thus the coin's market cap can't rise to lofty levels.
I'm not really opposed to your views, but it should be said that the Bitcoin economy works perfectly well with only a small fraction of the coins in float. It just doesn't matter what the price is. Volatility is more important, but it is declining with increasing price, and there are work-arounds for it. It is technically feasible to make volatility effectively irrelevant to transactional applications. Much wealth depends on this, so it will become pervasive.
If you're saying that bitcoin can't become valuable because it is too scarce, then I definitely have to disagree.
If you're saying that bitcoin can't become highly utile because it is too scarce, I also disagree because of infinite divisibility.
It would be a categorical error to blindly apply models developed and tested exclusively in an environment of finite divisibility to an environment of infinite divisibility.