Hi Onion,
Thanks again for the thoughtful reply.
Some great points. I really wish SE would hire a dedicated "Anti-Trust / Monopoly" Team (or put in engine checks) to see when potential Dumping would occur.
As you said, I think RMT Corporations could price dump and drive out real crafters & gatherers, and slowly increment their controlled market prices (keeping it super low, but with their army of bots / possessed Lalafell, they could probably earn a steady income at whatever pricing scheme they chose to run with, whether it was super low to keep regular players away, or suddenly jacking things up, and then price dumping again if people came in).
It's definitely a very complicated issue / situation and I'd say at least in some ways, XIV has been much more friendly to players to bypass RMT controlled situations: An individual player can take the time to farm their own mats (or with the help of a friend or two) and craft their own gear (or get real players to do it, etc.).
With most valuable Max Level Drops being U/U right now, that also effectively cuts out RMT Corporations as well.
I'll be curious to see how this develops later.