I think there is nothing surprising in the wipe. The game is developed continously, sometimes \'resets\' are needed to clean the effects of bug or inbalance exploits.
As for people getting big amounts of starting money? It doesn\'t count until everyone gets enough. The main problem is that a new player cannot even get enough money to use their pps without playing very-very monotonously...
Though I do hope when the \'real\' game starts noone will get starting advantage.