by
Jason Hickel
[...] OPEC states suddenly found themselves awash with excess cash worth more than $450 billion. The only problem was that they didn't know what to do with all that money. Because there was nowhere to invest it internally, Saudi Arabia and other OPEC nations decided to circulate or 'recycle' the money through Wall Street banks, probably to some extent under the pressure of US compulsion, as part of the negotiated settlement.
this money was recycled in the form of loans to the global South, who needed the money to build up industries (esp for import substitution purposes) AND, depressingly enough, to cover the higher costs of oil
ofc the banks were more than happy to facilitate this, esp since they got a cut--created a "global sub-prime market" (p151)