Maybe during its conception. Since the beginning of its release, alchemy has been a HUGE money pit. That was the goal. It was meant to pull gold out of circulation. It skyrocketed the prices of components, causing the marketplace tax to bring in more revenue. The crafting cost with gold threw out billions upon billions of gold.
I'm not sure about the profitability now with the caches being sold for 25k each in the Bifrost, but it might be a little more profitable now than before, although you'd be better off opening caches and selling them.