Through what mechanism would bots drive up the price? Are you claiming there are simplistic momentum bots out there with seemingly more cash than other bots that just buy up bitcoin causing it to rise, which causes them to buy more of it, ad nauseam?

For pump and dump schemes, aren't we past that stage for Bitcoin at least? Isn't Bitcoin too big and too "mainstream" to be pumped in some Telegraph channel? Maybe you can clarify what pump-and-dump strategy you think is being used here?

You'd need a lot of resources for pumping right now. Or maybe it's already happened quite a few times and everybody is doing it now, sort of like a meme?