Flawed statement. If it was never intended to make money by running missions, then why would they have made missions that return credit cases? They could have made it so that missions only reward augments and missions for other professions. But no, BW added possibility to send companion to get raw credits.
You have good points but this is not one of them.
My opinion is that maybe a nerf was needed, but it might have been a bit too steep one. But it could be BW's strategy; There is now more slicers than intended, so they make the missions unprofitable until the amount of slicers is balanced again, and then make slicing again profitable, but not so much as to again screw up the balance