manjaro-hello has an optional dependency on the applicaton-utility - so the Manjaro Hello will work witout Applications and as I recall - the Applications button is not available if the application-utility module is not installed.
The application-utility only uses pamac-cli and the package correctly pulls this dependency.
I did a check on it and found that the pamac-installer bin has been moved to the pamac-gtk package - thus making the applications installer not functional - if only the pamac-cli package is installed.