Square CEO Jack Dorsey said late on Friday the company might jump into the bitcoin mining business.
Dorsey tweeted that the company is considering a “bitcoin mining system based on custom silicon and open source for individuals and businesses worldwide.” The price of bitcoin rose above $62,000 following Dorsey’s string of tweets, as the world’s most popular cryptocurrency pushes toward its all-time high.
Dorsey’s goal would be to make crypto mining — the process of creating new bitcoins by solving increasingly complex computational problems — more accessible, much as Square’s original vision was to make it easier for small businesses and independent proprietors to take credit card payments. He wrote that bitcoin mining should be “as easy as plugging a rig into a power source.” Today, the bitcoin mining industry is dominated by large-scale players who can afford to buy tens of thousands of ASICs, the type of specialty gear used to mint new coin.
