Actually since the merge the population has been increasing and IM sales have been very good.
There's a lot of people coming back and buying the even more OP stuff from IM at far better prices than was offered when YNK was selling the epics and upgrades years ago.
That plus the large influx of homeless pinoys that came here when rohanPH shut down, there are a lot more players today than there was even 6 months ago. Chances are when you join a noob party to level up a character there will be one person from ph in the party with you.