{"id":493387,"date":"2026-02-27T09:41:09","date_gmt":"2026-02-27T09:41:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/493387\/"},"modified":"2026-02-27T09:41:09","modified_gmt":"2026-02-27T09:41:09","slug":"fintech-company-block-lays-off-more-than-4000-people-citing-ai","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/493387\/","title":{"rendered":"Fintech company Block lays off more than 4,000 people, citing AI"},"content":{"rendered":"

BANGKOK (AP) \u2014 Shares in the financial technology company Block soared more than 20% in premarket trading Friday after its CEO announced it was laying off more than 4,000 of its 10,000 plus employees, reconfiguring to capitalize on its use of artificial intelligence. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe core thesis is simple. Intelligence tools have changed what it means to build and run a company,\u201d Jack Dorsey said in a letter to shareholders in Block, the parent company to online payment platforms such as Square and Cash App. \u201cA significantly smaller team, using the tools we\u2019re building, can do more and do it better,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Dorsey\u2019s comments explicitly naming AI as a key driver behind the move were also posted on X, or Twitter, a company he co-founded. The assertion that the job cuts will add to Block\u2019s profitability and efficiency led investors to jump in and buy, analysts said. <\/p>\n

Block\u2019s shares gained 5% Thursday to $54.53, before it reported its earnings. They shot up to nearly $69 in after-hours trading. The mobile payments services provider reported its fourth quarter gross profit jumped 24% from a year earlier.<\/p>\n

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\"Currency<\/p>\n

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\u201cFor years, we have debated whether AI would dent jobs at the margin. Now we have a public case study in which the CEO explicitly says that intelligence tools have changed what it means to build and run a company,\u201d Stephen Innes of SPI Asset Management said in a commentary. <\/p>\n

\u201cOther large employers have announced tens of thousands of cuts in recent months. Some have downplayed the AI link. Block did not,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

A global technology company founded in 2009, San Francisco-based Block operates in the United States, Canada, parts of Europe, Australia and Japan. <\/p>\n

In a post on Twitter, Dorsey outlined various ways the company will support those laid off. For employees overseas, the terms might differ, he said.<\/p>\n

It was unclear which employees would be laid off where. <\/p>\n

Layoffs<\/a> by American companies remain at relatively healthy levels, but the job cuts at Block are the latest among thousands announced in recent months. <\/p>\n

A number of other high-profile companies have announced layoffs recently, including UPS<\/a>, Amazon<\/a>, Dow<\/a> and the Washington Post<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"BANGKOK (AP) \u2014 Shares in the financial technology company Block soared more than 20% in premarket trading Friday…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":493388,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[12300,181,28,1076,18849,793,851,11382,3002,1931,1929,5284,19000,74,35993,965],"class_list":{"0":"post-493387","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-amazon-com","9":"tag-artificial-intelligence","10":"tag-business","11":"tag-europe","12":"tag-financial-technology","13":"tag-general-news","14":"tag-inc","15":"tag-information-technology","16":"tag-jack-dorsey","17":"tag-jobs-and-careers","18":"tag-labor","19":"tag-san-francisco","20":"tag-stephen-innes","21":"tag-technology","22":"tag-united-parcel-service","23":"tag-world-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/493387","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=493387"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/493387\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/493388"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=493387"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=493387"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=493387"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}