Block, Inc., based by Jack Dorsey, the co-founder and ex-CEO of Twitter, is a monetary know-how firm with a deepening full-stack connection to the Bitcoin business by way of its subsidiaries. Its corporations span funds apps and service provider tooling with Bitcoin integration, the event of bitcoin mining {hardware}, open supply software program growth, a decentralized finance protocol for peer-to-peer markets and even a self-custody {hardware} pockets.
Previously referred to as Sq. and based in 2009, the corporate began integrating Bitcoin into its know-how providing as early as 2014 by way of Money App — its most well-known subsidiary — permitting retailers to just accept bitcoin funds by way of the app. In 2021, Sq. Inc formally rebranded to Block Inc, doubling down on its dedication to Bitcoin and affirming its imaginative and prescient of the long run as one the place the Bitcoin Blockchain would play a pivotal function. Sq. turned a subsidiary of Block Inc and now offers primarily with fee terminal know-how. At this time, Block has 8,584 BTC on its steadiness sheet valued at virtually 1 billion {dollars}, with a median buy worth of 30,405 {dollars} per bitcoin.
Of Block’s subsidiaries and investments, most have express connections to Bitcoin or blockchain programs akin to Money App, Bitkey, Proto, Spiral, TBD and Tidal. All of them are advancing Bitcoin adoption at numerous ranges of the business and have rising affect and gratitude from the Bitcoin group. Jack Dorsey has been a number one donor to varied Bitcoin nonprofits and group efforts, together with OpenSats, which funds open supply Bitcoin growth and thru which a substantial amount of Nostr — a Bitcoin-native social community protocol — has been bootstrapped.
In an unique interview with Bitcoin Journal, Mile Suter, product lead at Block shared insights into their imaginative and prescient for the long run and Bitcoin’s perfect function in it, saying that, “We expect Bitcoin achieves its final future when it’s getting used as on a regular basis cash. Similar to Satoshi supposed. I believe that Bitcoin as a world monetary infrastructure that everybody can entry lets corporations like Block function in a way more world method. And I believe that funds are important to sustaining the core properties that make Bitcoin distinctive and in the end will make it win in the long term.”
Under you’ll discover brief overviews of a few of Block’s Bitcoin-related corporations, significantly these serving retail, with unique quotes from Suter on how they serve vital roles within the path to hyperbitcoinization.
Sq.
Launched in 2009, Sq. is a point-of-sale (POS) system enabling retailers to just accept card funds and handle operations like stock, payroll, and enterprise loans. Serving 4 million sellers and processing $241 billion yearly as of 2024, Sq. introduced that it started rolling out Bitcoin funds for retailers on the Bitcoin Vegas convention in 2025, permitting them to just accept bitcoin seamlessly by way of its POS {hardware}.
The transfer marks a serious milestone in Bitcoin’s integration with retail fee programs, establishing a lacking pillar up till now within the enterprise toolkit wanted to essentially use bitcoin as a medium of trade. “On the Sq. aspect, we have now over 4 million retailers within the U.S. with a full suite of point-of-sale, stock, taxes, reporting, like one of the best within the enterprise when it comes to conventional funds processing. This initiative goes past simply Bitcoin funds,” stated Suter.
With the full-stack accounting integration of Bitcoin, retailers that needed to just accept the digital forex however couldn’t due to lack of tooling now have the door extensive open. However the imaginative and prescient is larger than that. “And we’re going to offer a full-stack Bitcoin banking suite particularly designed for small companies,” Suter added, leaning into the rising pattern of bitcoin treasury corporations and techniques that’s dominating Bitcoin information at present.
Corporations will quickly have all of the instruments to just accept bitcoin funds and put them instantly into their firm treasury quite than immediately promote bitcoin for {dollars}. In the event that they want liquidity, they’re already capable of put that bitcoin as collateral and get dollar-denominated loans straight to their checking account by way of corporations like Unchained — although, undoubtedly, Block can also be transferring in that route for his or her purchasers. Suter added that “one factor I really like about this full-stack Bitcoin banking suite is that we’re democratizing entry to Bitcoin treasury instruments that had been beforehand solely out there to massive companies. I imagine that holding Bitcoin in your steadiness sheet shouldn’t simply be a Wall Avenue luxurious.”
Money App
Money App, maybe essentially the most famend model inside the Block portfolio, completes the retail funds aspect of the hyperbitcoinization engine Block is constructing. Launched in 2013, Money App is a consumer-focused digital pockets with a reported 57 million energetic customers in 2024, providing person-to-person funds, debit playing cards, shares and Bitcoin buying and selling, and tax submitting. Money App reported $10 billion in bitcoin-sourced income in 2024, making up 62% the full, by charging ~2% per commerce.
Money App may additionally be the primary mainstream funds app to combine Lightning, Bitcoin’s funds community. It’s on the chopping fringe of the business, producing the best publicly disclosed, bitcoin-denominated income however working the Lightning Community at 9.7% return. This isn’t some bizarre crypto magic yield, and might solely be achieved by ensuring bitcoin funds are extremely environment friendly and dependable. Suited famous that “to me, it’s proof that Bitcoin is already a functioning fee community, not digital gold. It’s greater than that. And I don’t wish to get too into the weeds right here, however I can confidently say that we have now essentially the most proficient set of Lightning engineers on this planet engaged on these issues.”
Exalted concerning the success of Money App’s Bitcoin integration, Suter added that “we’re tremendous enthusiastic about Lightning’s function in making Bitcoin on a regular basis cash as a result of that’s actually, from a Block Inc. perspective, we imagine that’s important for Bitcoin’s future, Satoshi’s authentic imaginative and prescient, peer-to-peer digital money.”
Shoppers can not simply simply purchase and ship bitcoin by way of Money App, but additionally automate purchases, an funding technique often known as DCA or greenback value averaging, which has been mathematically demonstrated to be probably the greatest funding methods there are in bitcoin.
The mixture of Money App and Sq. unlocks what tech individuals name a “fly wheel,” a time period used to explain self-reinforcing loops of shopper and enterprise conduct that may drive a enterprise to new heights and which is normally not potential if a constructing block in that enterprise logic is lacking. Maybe with these two main integrations, the imaginative and prescient of Bitcoin funds dreamt about by early adopters for over a decade, which have not likely labored very effectively up till now, can lastly change into a actuality.
Bitkey
Anchored within the elementary worth proposition of Bitcoin — censorship resistance by way of particular person liberty and self custody — Block has launched a brand new {hardware} pockets product referred to as Bitkey. The gadget is designed particularly for Bitcoin safety, utilizing a well-liked know-how referred to as multisignature, which decentralize the passwords — non-public keys— wanted to maneuver the bitcoin to a few totally different units: the Bitkey {hardware}, a key saved for restoration in Block’s servers and a 3rd key encrypted with the consumer’s credentials and saved on the consumer’s chosen Google drive account.
The Bitkey, launched globally in 2024, makes numerous design selections that depart from the best way different {hardware} wallets within the business operate — essentially the most major and controversial distinction being that it by no means exhibits non-public key materials to the consumer. In contrast to each different {hardware} pockets and most self-custody Bitcoin and crypto apps, Bitkey hides key materials virtually totally from the consumer, as a substitute giving them numerous well-designed instruments to safe, get well and inherit their bitcoin securely to their family members. Suter famous that “we constructed Bitkey to increase who can safely self-custody. We — Bitcoiners — joke that you need to onboard your grandma to self-custody, however I hear numerous tales of that being true and folks reaching out as a result of the onboarding was so seamless.”
The gadget seems and appears like alien know-how, each unit with a singular blended stone sample, and that lights as much as the contact, like it’s alive. It’s a profound rethinking of self custody, born of a deep critique of the consumer expertise of the normal Bitcoin seed backup method. Whereas the design has been available in the market for barely a 12 months and no public information on gross sales numbers has been launched, it is going to be fascinating to see if they will break new floor into {hardware} pockets adoption — a metric traditionally poor for an business so culturally outlined by self custody.
