Oil swung on Monday and is still near its highs: Brent ended at $109.55 on Yahoo Finance data, roughly flat on the day, and traded near $110.6 early on Tuesday (data pulled at about 06:30 UTC). TheStreet’s Monday wrap reported that Brent fell 1.5% in the morning after the US waived Russia sanctions, that US crude then rose more than 2% by the close after Houthi attacks on Saudi targets, and that Saudi Arabia postponed its Future Investment Initiative conference to 2027. Bitcoin shrugged: it closed Monday at $81,838, down 0.2% on the day. That raises a question we can test. When oil jumps, does bitcoin fall?
We matched Brent futures to bitcoin for the 250 trading days from 20 October 2025 to 19 October 2026. On the 67 days Brent rose 2% or more, bitcoin averaged −0.46% on the same day, against −0.10% across all 250 days. That is a drag in the direction a worried investor would expect, but it is small next to bitcoin’s ordinary daily swings, and it is not statistically distinguishable from zero. This is a study of past data, not a forecast.
Why the question matters now
Oil is the macro variable readers are asking about. The same Monday market report says Iran’s Revolutionary Guard has not yet deployed its full capabilities to close the Strait of Hormuz and has warned about undersea cables in the strait, according to the KuCoin daily market report of 20 October. Russia has offered to mediate between Iran and the US. Brent has traded between $58.92 and $118.35 over the past year, so a 2% daily jump is an ordinary event in this market: it happened on 67 of 250 trading days, or 27% of the sample.
This desk looked at the same question on 12 October in Does Falling Oil Lift Bitcoin?, which used 1.5%, 3% and 5% thresholds and found oil spikes were a mild headwind. This piece re-runs the test on a window that now runs to 19 October and a 2% threshold, adds what happens over the next day and week, and checks whether the result holds in both halves of the year. The headline finding is the same, which is itself a useful out-of-sample check.
Result 1: a small same-day drag
| Group (Brent daily change) | Days | Mean BTC, same day | Median | Std. error | BTC up |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| All trading days | 250 | −0.10% | −0.23% | 0.17 | 111 of 250 |
| Brent up 2% or more | 67 | −0.46% | −0.61% | 0.28 | 24 of 67 |
| Brent up 3% or more | 48 | −0.60% | −0.73% | 0.32 | 17 of 48 |
| Brent up 5% or more | 15 | −0.15% | −0.75% | 0.68 | 7 of 15 |
| Brent up less than 2% | 183 | +0.03% | — | — | — |
| Brent down 2% or more | 48 | +0.02% | +0.12% | 0.41 | 26 of 48 |
Source: Yahoo Finance daily closes for Brent futures (BZ=F) and BTC-USD, 20 October 2025 to 19 October 2026; our calculation. Bitcoin’s return is the UTC close-to-close move on the date of Brent’s trading session.
Bitcoin rose on only 24 of the 67 oil-spike days, 36%, against 44% on all days. The mean difference between spike days and the 183 days when Brent rose less than 2% is −0.50 percentage points, with a standard error of 0.35, a t-statistic of about −1.4. That is below the usual threshold of 2 for calling an effect real. Bitcoin’s average on days of 3%-plus jumps is slightly worse at −0.60%, but days of 5%-plus jumps average −0.15% on only 15 observations, so the pattern does not strengthen as oil rises further.
The size of the effect matters too. Bitcoin’s standard deviation on an ordinary day in this sample is 2.63%. A −0.46% average is less than a fifth of one such move. Of the 67 spike days, 16 saw bitcoin fall 2% or more, 24%, against 30 of the 183 other days, 16%. So the bad days are somewhat more common when oil spikes, but most oil-spike days passed without a large bitcoin drop.
Result 2: nothing follows on the next day or week
| Window after the oil-spike day | Mean BTC, spike days | Mean BTC, all days | Days up (spike) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Next day | −0.17% | −0.15% | 32 of 67 |
| Next five days | +0.40% | −0.18% | 31 of 66 |
Whatever drag appears on the day does not carry over. The next-day figure for spike days (−0.17%) is the same as for all days (−0.15%). Over five days bitcoin averaged +0.40% after spike days, but the median was −0.24%, and the mean is pulled up by one outlier: the 17 August 2026 spike was followed by a 19.5% gain over five days. Without that single episode the five-day average would be lower, so we do not read anything into it. The honest summary is that oil jumps have not been a reliable signal for where bitcoin goes next.
Result 3: the sign has been the same in both halves of the year, but the sample is thin
| Period | Brent spike days (2%+) | Mean BTC, spike days | Mean BTC, all days in period |
|---|---|---|---|
| 20 Oct 2025 – 31 Mar 2026 | 29 | −0.67% | −0.27% |
| 1 Apr – 19 Oct 2026 | 38 | −0.31% | +0.03% |
Bitcoin fell on average on spike days in both periods, and in both the gap to the period’s overall average was about 0.3 to 0.4 points. A consistent sign is mildly reassuring, but each half rests on 29 or 38 days with standard errors of 0.49 and 0.33, so neither is significant alone. We also split the sample after seeing the first results, which raises the chance of finding a pattern by luck. The 12 October study, which used Coinbase closes and a window ending 9 October, reported −0.59% for 3%-plus jumps against our −0.60%.
Putting it in context: what moves with oil is mostly inflation and rates
If oil has any effect on bitcoin, the most plausible route is through inflation and interest rates rather than directly. The 10-year Treasury yield was 5.15% on 19 October, up from 5.09% on 16 October, according to the US Treasury’s daily par yield curve. Freddie Mac’s 30-year fixed mortgage rate averaged 7.40% last week, the highest in nearly three years, and builder sentiment fell to 29, its lowest since June 2012, per TheStreet’s summary of the data. In a world where the Federal Reserve is raising rates, an oil spike that adds to inflation can matter more for risk assets through the Fed’s 28 October decision than through any direct link.
Our earlier work points the same way. We found no directional edge for bitcoin on Fed days in our study of 38 FOMC meetings. Oil looks like another macro variable with a modest, noisy link to bitcoin.
What this means for the next few days
Three descriptive points follow from the data. First, a jump in oil has historically coincided with a slightly worse bitcoin day, about half a percentage point on average, but the effect is within the noise. Second, large bitcoin drops are somewhat more common on oil-spike days, 24% against 16%, so risk managers have reason to keep oil on the watchlist. Third, there is no evidence in our sample that the day’s move carries into the following days. Monday itself fits the pattern of a muted reaction: US crude rose more than 2% at the close while bitcoin moved −0.2%.
None of this makes bitcoin a hedge against geopolitical risk, and none of it makes it a casualty. In this sample it behaved like a high-volatility asset that sometimes dips on energy shocks and often does not. A different set of oil days, such as a true closure of the Strait of Hormuz, could behave differently, and no sample of past data can tell us how.
Method and limits
Method: Brent futures (BZ=F) and bitcoin (BTC-USD) daily closes from Yahoo Finance, 20 October 2025 to 19 October 2026. We kept the 250 Brent trading sessions in that window and matched each to bitcoin’s UTC close-to-close return on the same calendar date. Because Brent’s session closes in the evening in Europe and bitcoin’s UTC day ends at midnight, bitcoin’s same-day return includes some hours after the oil move; Monday returns for Brent cover the weekend gap while bitcoin’s cover one day. Forward returns use the next one and five calendar days of bitcoin closes. Standard errors assume independent days, which understates uncertainty. The 3% and 5% thresholds, the half-year split and the large-drop count were added after seeing the first results. Differences of this size are not statistically significant at conventional levels. Market-news facts come from TheStreet, KuCoin and the US Treasury, as linked.
Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice. Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are volatile and you can lose some or all of the money you put in. Nothing here is a recommendation to buy, sell or hold bitcoin, any fund or any company's shares. Do your own research and consider speaking to a licensed financial adviser.