STEEM price down but STEEM POWER UP?!?

Within the last week after the hack and heroics of the development team at Steemit,  the price of STEEM has gone from 3.50 - 2.50 and has fallen below Ripple into 3rd place with a 225M market cap.  As I understand it, if you bought STEEM in your wallet at 3.50 and intent to sell not you will lose money.  However, if you are holding SP or SD, you are earning interest on your investment regardless of market fluctuations of STEEM.   This got me thinking about how to determine the rate of SP being created and is that solely related to community activity and nothing else?  Is  community activity equivalent to daily dividends paid in SP to the long term investor (eg., users of the platform)?   Where can we see the rate of SP being created?

That being said, I'm enjoying this experiment while working through my understanding of the ecosystem.  I have decided to stay in for the long term by investing in SP.  

Any insights would be greatly appreciated!