Sounds scary the way you present it so I’ll try to make it a bit less.
- “Early insiders" = the operators who ran the network and paid to bootstrap it when everyone else said no thanks.
They earned CC by doing the work, not through an allocation. Same as Bitcoin miners in year one.
- Scarcity:
Canton runs on burn-mint equilibrium. Every fee paid to use the network is burned. Issuance is capped and scheduled. As usage grows, burns outpace minting and supply contracts. Scarcity is earned through real activity, not promised through a fixed cap.
- Volatility and speculation:
you're right, the design suppresses both. That's a bug if you're here to trade and a feature if you're an institution settling real value. Durable value comes from usage, not flipping.
- On the "100 wallets": look at who they are. Super validators who bootstrapped the network, custodians like BitGo holding for their clients, and exchanges holding for their users. One custody or exchange wallet can represent thousands of holders. Counting wallets isn't counting owners, on any chain.