With the advent of the former prime minister Rafik Hariri, Lebanon adopted the rentier economy policy which is based on supporting the services sectors at the expense of the productive ones.

According to that policy, the banking sector was prioritized to the extent of raising the interest rates in order to attract capital.

Thus, the investors tended to deposit their funds in the banks in order to benefit from the high interest rates and avoid running businesses which may not be lucrative.

Among those depositors were Saudi royals and businessmen who took the advantage of a 40% interest rate in order to gain huge amounts of money.

According to reports, the Saudis gained around  $40 billion while their government deposited only $1 billion in Lebanon’s Central Bank.

Meanwhile, Saudi deals with Lebanon with abundant superiority and alleges to be the basic funder of the Lebanese government and sets political conditions to pursue its ‘support’ policy. Whereas, facts say that it exploited its relation with some political parties in Lebanon in order to make huge amounts of money.

Source: Al-Manar English Website