油元（Petrodollar）是指一国出售石油所赚取的报酬，此名称为1973年美国乔治城大学的Ibrahim Oweiss教授所发明。1970年代正值石油危机，OPEC的产油国皆因而攫取了大笔外汇，为了便于描述这些数量庞大的资本及其衍生的经济现象，Ibrahim Oweiss教授便结合了「petroleum（石油）」和「dollar（元）」创造了「油元」一词。

Petrodollar recycling is the international deployment of a country's revenue from petroleum exports. It generally refers to the phenomenon of major petroleum-exporting nations – mainly the OPEC members and Russia – earning more money from the export of crude oil than they could feasibly invest in their own economies. The resulting global interdependencies and financial flows, from oil producers back to oil consumers, can reach a scale of hundreds of billions of US dollars per year across a variety of currencies, heavily influenced by government-level decisions. The phenomenon is most pronounced during periods when the price of oil is historically high.