After it was datamined, and a Blizz rep posted in the thread and confirmed it, you had 9 months to build up the gold.
I was lucky, and had a work schedule that allowed me to work the heck out of my profession and go from 2k gold to the cost of owning it in 3.5 months.
I can only imagine that the majority did not have the gift of abundant time, let alone the skill set to take advantage of it.
It’s their game, I don’t have a beef with them removing it, even if I wouldn’t. I do, however, have a huge problem with them not announcing it. Would they have waited until 2 months to go? One? We’ll never know, but 9 months was short and a shock. They should have just artificially extended its availability to equal an announcement at the beginning of the expac.
Edited to add: Since there seems to be some disbelief - the original breaking thread: