I know I quote Hanlon's Razor quite a bit, however these folk have too many brain cells to get by with "stupidity."

Greedy is more accurate.

just the former - they understand the catch very clearly - it's exactly how they want it to be

I’m not so sure they truly thought this all the way through. To destroy the economic system and world order that allowed them to gain wealth seems rather stupid to me. There do need to be consumers with means enough to buy their widgets after all…