31 January 1990: McDonald's opens in Moscow
McDonald's opened its first restaurant in the Soviet Union on Pushkin Square in Moscow, and tens of thousands of people queued for hours to try a Big Mac. For many it was the first taste of Western consumer capitalism. Within two years the Soviet Union itself was gone. McDonald's stayed until 2022, when it exited Russia after the invasion of Ukraine. Burgers, it turned out, were not a peace treaty.
The lesson: Geopolitics can open a huge market in a day and close it again just as quickly.
What it meant for investors
$1,000 in McDonald's at the start of 1990 → $37,500 today, vs $19,429 in the S&P 500.
We start the clock at the start of 1990, the year it happened. That is 37.5 times the money, and $18,071 more than a plain index fund made over the same years.
What McDonald's teaches: A mature company can create significant value by fixing its existing operations rather than chasing expansion; same-store improvement beats sheer growth.
| Bought in | Price then | Worth today | S&P 500 would be |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1990 | $8.00 | $37,500 | $19,429 |
| 1995 | $14.00 | $21,429 | $14,783 |
| 2000 | $40.00 | $7,500 | $4,626 |
green = beat the S&P 500 · red = lost money
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