But you know as well as I that the "consensus" decision was made on this change much later than that - when the late cycle situation was well known.
As far as a "final/official" decision, sure. But there was no significant objection to it afaik at the time it was implemented and merged in github (July 20 btw). As a practical matter, it was going to get deployed, the only question was when (which was mostly a function of the rest of the HF20 development cycle).
Even before July 20, it was @timcliff who implemented the code change and he didn't go ahead with doing so until he felt there was already a reasonable consensus in support of it. Maybe he has a better idea of that chronology.
This is semantics really. Again you know as well as I that a large portion of the demand has been coming from speculation and people trying to take advantage of the assymetrical trade
And that speculation was driven by limited/low supply. You suggest allowing for reverse conversions as a source of additional supply, which I mostly support. Printing is another source (which I also support). Both more printing and reverse conversions are a deterrent to speculation, in both cases by holding more supply over the market.
and are reacting to them before "consensus" is being formally reached?
Again, there was no real question about it getting deployed once it was implemented in the code base. There literally wasn't any discussion at all about removing it. None.
Of course, one can absolutely question the rationality of the market and whether people pay attention to github (or even upcoming hard fork/release announcements). But it is also the case that with a print cap, particularly a low one, market participants betting on SBD to pump are not necessarily irrational. Once printing stops, there is nothing short of a hard fork or a market crash to bring the price down.