Square buys $50 million bitcoin, a larger investment in crypto

Square the payments platform has acquired $50 million in bitcoin, part of its more considerable investment in cryptocurrency, the company announced on Thursday.

Square bought a total of 4,709 bitcoins, which the firm states represent about 1 per cent of its total assets as of the end of the second quarter.

Square told it was getting the purchase because it considers “bitcoin has the potential to be a universal currency in the future,” calling cryptocurrency “an instrument of financial empowerment” that “provides a space for the world to compete in a global monetary system.” Square has admitted bitcoin as a form of payment since 2014.

Jack Dorsey, CEO of Twitter and Square, has long been a champion of bitcoin, stating in 2018 that he considers it will ultimately become the world’s single currency within the next decade.

Dorsey, who also has an undisclosed amount of bitcoin especially, stated during an income call in 2018 that “Bitcoin, for us, is not standing at buying and selling.

We do believe that this is a transformational technology for our business, and we want to learn as soon as possible.”

Square appended bitcoin trading to its Cash app in 2018, and last year, it set Square Crypto, an independent team that adds to bitcoin open-source work.

Last month, Square started the nonprofit Cryptocurrency Open Patent Alliance, pointed at holding the open-source nature of cryptocurrency alive by pooling patents in a shared library to “defend upon patent aggressors.”

Bitcoin’s price is around $10,775 today.

In May, Square proclaimed its bitcoin revenue for the first quarter was $306 million, on total revenue of $1.38 billion.

That’s an improvement of 367 percent from the year-ago quarter, the company stated, continuing that the increase was “due to growth in the number of active bitcoin customers, as well as growth in customer interest.”