McDonald’s: When the Happy Meal Turns Unhappy

McDonald’s dropped about 12% in September. Apparently, investors have finally discovered a healthier alternative to healthy McBurgers. Jokes aside, the move was anything but random from a technical perspective. The long-term Elliott Wave structure had been warning for some time that the rally was ending in an Ending Diagonal — and those structures have a rather unpleasant habit of retracing much faster than they were built.

The September 9 chart already showed the setup clearly. The diagonal had completed near the top, price broke lower, and the larger corrective roadmap pointed toward substantially deeper levels. Fast-forward a few weeks, and MCD has simply continued doing what an exhausted Ending Diagonal is supposed to do: unwind. The stock is now trading well below, with the decline accelerating rather than showing convincing signs of a durable bottom.

The first meaningful support area sits around $211, followed by deeper Fibonacci levels near $171 and $131. The broader target zone around $124–130 remains very much alive if the correction develops as expected. That would sound dramatic from today’s price, but Ending Diagonals are not exactly known for gentle exits. Once the final wave finishes, the market often tries to retrace the entire structure — and sometimes does so with surprising enthusiasm.

So far, nothing in the larger Elliott Wave picture suggests that the correction has finished. McDonald’s may eventually find a solid bottom and start rebuilding, but technically the diet still looks incomplete. The burgers may be getting healthier; the chart, for now, is not.