Square, the payments processing company, has revealed that it sold $34.1 million in bitcoin during the first quarter.
However, while this figure looks impressive, it’s reported that the company spent $33.9 million in order to purchase the cryptocurrency. This was so users could trade bitcoin through its Cash mobile payments app, reports CNBC. As a result, the revenue it received from its sale was $200,000.
The San Francisco-based company, which was co-founded by Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey, enabled cryptocurrency trading via its Cash app in January. Through the app, most customers are able to buy and sell bitcoin on its platform. Customers are limited to $10,000 in bitcoin buys a week; however, there’s no limit to the amount that is subsequently sold.
At the time, Dorsey said via a tweet that:
We support bitcoin because we see it as a long-term path towards greater financial access for all. This is a small step.
News of Square’s bitcoin selling also came amid the announcement that the company reported a total net revenue of $669 million for the first three months. This figure gives it a 45 percent increase compared to the previous year. Such is Dorsey’s confidence in where bitcoin is heading that he believes that it will be the world’s single currency in 10 years.
In March, in a report from The Times, the CEO of Square and Twitter said:
The world ultimately will have a single currency, the internet will have a single currency. I personally believe that it will be bitcoin.
Even though Square has experienced positive revenue with the amount of bitcoin it has sold, Dorsey hasn’t had the best start of the year regarding Twitter. The company has had its fair share of fake profiles, which have targeted unsuspecting victims with the promise of large cryptocurrency gains. In a bid to curb misleading advertisements related to the cryptocurrency market Twitter has followed in the footsteps of Facebook and Google by announcing that it has banned digital currency adverts.
Image from Shutterstock.