Square reports $528M in Q1 revenue from its Cash App, with $306M coming from Bitcoin transactions, exceeding the app's fiat revenue of $222M for the first time
Square has been scaling Cash App's bitcoin business all year: it processed $148M in bitcoin sales in Q3 2019 and debuted a new fee structure for the feature, then reported that nearly half of Q4's $361M Cash App revenue came from bitcoin at $178M, up 240% YoY.
Q1 2020 is the crossover quarter — bitcoin's $306M share now exceeds fiat's $222M within a $528M Cash App total, confirming the trajectory the last two quarters established rather than introducing a new one.
First-order effects
Square's Cash App is now, by revenue line, a bitcoin trading product first and a fiat payments app second — investor perception of the segment shifts accordingly.
Second-order effects
The momentum carried straight through: Square's next quarterly report showed Cash App generating $875M in bitcoin revenue with gross profit up 167% YoY, and the stock rose 13% on the print.
Third-order effects
Because bitcoin revenue tracks transaction volume at thin margins — Square earned just $2M profit on $148M of Q3 2019 bitcoin sales — fintech P&Ls built this way become levered to crypto market cycles rather than steady payments take rates.
The trend: Consumer payment apps are converting into retail crypto trading rails, with bitcoin volume lines overtaking their original fiat businesses.
Bitcoin is a big bright spot for @Square and a testimonial to how @Jack can build opportunities for the company. It was not easy to support Bitcoin in the early days and be in banking and payments. To explain mining and the blockchain to folks in traditional banking was hard. htt…
Coinbase made that in two days last week ..to put things in perspective (if they mean volumes and not actual fee revenues which I suppose is the case ) https://twitter.com/...
@JWilliamsFstmed Huge fan of Cash App and BTC purchases are clearly growing but this ain't right. Per GAAP, revenue $SQ reports from BTC is Gross Merchandise Volume (GMV, or “volume"), not take rate. Unfortunately, this confusion results in (incorrect) stories like this: https://…
Square's @CashApp shattered its quarterly #Bitcoin sales volume record in Q1 2020 The firm said it generated $306 Million in #BTC revenue @Square reported that volumes were up 72% quarter-over-quarter & 367% year-over-year https://www.theblockcrypto.com/ ...
Bitcoin revenue beat out fiat revenue for the first time this quarter in @CashApp “Cash App brought in $222 million on all its other fiat-powered services in Q1...revenue from bitcoin was $306 million.” https://www.coindesk.com/...
> Square's gross profit from bitcoin sales nearly doubled from the last quarter (~90%), based on the results. The firm reported that volumes were up 72% quarter-over-quarter and 367% year-over-year. https://www.theblockcrypto.com/ ... https://twitter.com/...
Square reported $306 million in bitcoin revenue via its Cash App for the first quarter of 2020. #Bitcoin is picking up massive steam going into the halving. https://www.theblockcrypto.com/ ... https://twitter.com/...