I think your wrong here. Quality pins will always command high dollars. I just bought an AFM of quality and paid a good price.

Poor quality pins are getting the dollars they deserve, poor.

I tend to agree with this, but I don't pretend to understand the global financial thing or its impact on the subject.
Pinballs are funny animals and their price/value doesn't necessarily reflect the overall state of affairs IMHO.
While it's obviously distressing to think of one's collection decreasing in "paper value" I still view mine in "pleasure value" terms and happily it looks like $1M to me . . .