The McRib Indicator: Is the McDonald’s special correlated to Bitcoin?

The McRib made its debut in 1981 as one of McDonald’s most popular offerings. Rather than remaining on the permanent menu, the sandwich appears on a time-limited basis. This scarcity-based strategy fuels anticipation and drives social media engagement each time the McRib returns and has arguably turned it into a cultural icon and marketing triumph.

A few days ago, McDonald’s Senior Marketing Director Guillaume Huin acknowledged the McRib’s remarkable online presence on X, saying:

‘The legendary McRib returns 11/11 at most McDonald's in the US. It is our most-mentioned limited-time product online, higher than other evergreen items, particularly on X. 

Funnily enough and entirely independent of McDonald's involvement, the McRib has recently found new meaning on the internet within the trading and crypto community, as some claim Bitcoin and S&P500 tend to perform well after the McRib makes a comeback, particularly in 2017, 2020, 2021. Coincidentally, when the McRib returned to stores in December 2024, Bitcoin hit a new all-time high.

McRib returns and Bitcoin performance

When viewed chronologically, McRib reintroductions do sometimes appear to coincide with key moments in Bitcoin’s price history.

In November 2017, for example, McDonald’s brought back the McRib just as Bitcoin began its famous surge to a then-record high of around $19,500 by mid-December. The timing seemed uncanny, cementing the first clear ‘positive correlation.’ 

Three years later, in December 2020, the pattern repeated. The McRib returned on 2 December, and within weeks Bitcoin set a new all-time high of $19,850. Over the following months, the price climbed another 237%, making this the most dramatic confirmation of the McRib effect.

And in November 2023, another reintroduction preceded a 71% gain in Bitcoin. Together, these events form the core of the positive correlation narrative.

But the story is not one-sided. In 2018, after another McRib comeback, Bitcoin plunged to $3,250, ending one of the worst bear markets in its history. The same pattern of disappointment re-emerged in 2021, when the McRib returned on 1 November. Although Bitcoin initially reached a record $68,742 on November 10, the price later collapsed by 74%, ushering in the crypto winter. A similar decline followed the 2022 release, with Bitcoin falling to $15,500.

The most recent data, from 11 November 2025 shows Bitcoin rising about 6% after the McRib’s reappearance, trading near $105,600. Yet the coin has since fallen below $100,000 and remains more than 20% below its October 2025 all-time high of $126,080, leaving the outcome of this latest instance unresolved.

Across the eight recorded McRib returns since 2017, five instances corresponded with Bitcoin price increases, while three were followed by declines. The strongest rally came in 2020, when Bitcoin surged more than 237%, while the most severe reversal occurred in 2021, with a 74% post-peak drop.

Although this success rate appears mildly encouraging, it falls short of statistical significance. The McRib effect, in other words, may slightly outperform random chance, but not enough to serve as a dependable investment signal.

McRib Comebacks and Lean Hog Prices

A competing theory posits that McDonald’s times the McRib’s return based on pork prices rather than cultural factors, reintroducing the sandwich when pork costs decline, thereby maximising profit margins.

An examination of lean hog futures offers mixed support. In 2020, pork traded around $65/lbs, a relatively low level, and in 2024, at a moderate $75/lbs; both favorable conditions. Yet in 2021 and 2022, when prices reached $110/lbs and $95/lbs respectively, the McRib still came back. 

This inconsistency undermines the pork price hypothesis, suggesting that the timing involves other marketing and seasonal considerations.

The real story: Pattern recognition

The persistence of the McRib-Bitcoin connection says less about economics and more about human psychology. Our brains are wired to find patterns, even when none exist. When coincidences repeat, they capture attention and spread rapidly online.

Several cognitive biases reinforce this illusion. 

• Pattern recognition bias leads traders to connect unrelated events. 
• Confirmation bias ensures that we remember the successful correlations (such as 2020’s rally) while forgetting failures like 2021’s crash. 
• Survivorship bias further amplifies the illusion, as viral successes dominate social media, while incorrect predictions quietly fade away.

Seasonal factors also contribute to the overlap. The McRib typically returns in the fourth quarter, a period when Bitcoin often experiences increased trading activity due to holiday consumer spending, portfolio rebalancing, and tax-year considerations. The apparent connection may therefore reflect shared timing rather than genuine causation.

While the McRib theory entertains traders, Bitcoin’s price is driven by tangible macroeconomic and technical forces. These include monetary policy, regulatory changes, institutional investment, and the cyclical Bitcoin halving events that occur roughly every four years. 

None of these variables bear any logical connection to McDonald’s marketing calendar. Thus, from an economic standpoint, the McRib effect remains a coincidence, an amusing footnote in crypto folklore rather than an analytical tool.

However, traders’ faith in the effect could eventually bring it to life, turning coincidence into a self-fulfilling prophecy.

The idea that a fast-food sandwich could influence a trillion-dollar digital asset is both humorous and revealing. It underscores how social media culture, cognitive bias and viral storytelling can blur the line between market myth and meaningful data.

In the end, the McRib phenomenon may be best understood not as a trading tool, but as a reflection of our instinct to find order amid chaos, and our collective fascination with the strange coincidences that define internet-era finance.

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