The price of the token may increase without trading, but trading is the only way for the token to reach its fair price.
Reasons for 1 token's price increase:
- The project has more strategic partners;
- Token satisfies an additional number of laws;
- The community of the token is expanded through new outreach activities;
- Positive media coverage about the project;
- The project has achieved some achievements: ATM, transaction speed ...;
- Celebrities mention tokens & projects ...
However, if there is absolutely no trading activity, the person who needs to own the token will not be able to buy the token, the person who wants to make profit cannot sell the token, i.e. the community cannot know the value of the token 
Thus Trading is the way for tokens to step up to their new prices.
If Trading is the cause for the price increase: it is only a temporary fluctuation.
I doubt your conclusion, I don't think the prices increase is only a temporary fluctuation becaue fluctuations has been a constant thing and it through fluctuation we know that prices has move from one prices regime to another, that is, increase or decrease. Demand and supply rules are the basic causes of fluctuation and I think it is a part of any market conditions.
In a nutshell, trading activities has a greater influence than investment in my opinion.
Maybe I should take an example so you can better understand my opinion. Consider the price of BTC.
If BTC price increases due to the following reasons:
- 1 country, such as China or the United States, accepts the legality of BTC in the payment system;
- There are thousands more BTC ATMs worldwide;
- Halving

- Elon Musk mentioned BTC and wants to buy about 10000 BTC;
...
The price of BTC will increase steadily over a long period of time.
Now that the demand for BTC is increasing, people see BTC as a means of payment or hoarding assets => the price of BTC increases through trading.
In another scenario, if trading is the only cause of BTC prices increasing, for example, whales bought 1 million BTC, causing the price of BTC to increase, stimulating purchases from users, the price of BTC will spike. But almost right after this whale will discharge BTC, at the same time the buyers will sell BTC to earn short profit => BTC price back to the old level or lower than the old level. The price of BTC fluctuates temporarily because buyers & sellers only see it as a tool for surfing to make a profit.