Square gains 10% as the payments company rides bitcoin's record-breaking rise

• Shares of payments company Square surged as much as 10% on Monday after Tesla announced it is investing $1.5 billion into Bitcoin.
• Square, led by Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, announced last October that it had purchased 4,709 bitcoins at average price of $10,617 per coin.
• Earlier in February, Dorsey reinforced his support for the popular cryptocurrency by launching his own "node."
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Shares of payments company Square surged 10% on Monday after Tesla announced it is investing $1.5 billion into Bitcoin. The electric carmaker also said it may begin accepting the currency as payment, according to a regulatory filing.

In October 2020, Square announced it had purchased 4,709 bitcoins for an aggregate price of $50 million. The San Francisco-based company paid an average price of $10,617 for each bitcoin.

Square launched bitcoin trading in 2018 with Cash App, a platform that enables the buying and selling of bitcoin. Cash App generated $1.63 billion of bitcoin revenue during the third quarter of 2020 and $32 million of bitcoin gross profit. In 2019, the company also established Square Crypto, an independent team focused on contributing to bitcoin open-source work.

"We believe that bitcoin has the potential to be a more ubiquitous currency in the future," said Square's Chief Financial Officer, Amrita Ahuja in a statement.

Square is headed by Jack Dorsey, who is a longtime cryptocurrency advocate. Earlier in February, Dorsey reinforced his support for the popular cryptocurrency by launching his own "node," a component in a blockchain's infrastructure that guarantees the security and accuracy of data and is crucial to keeping the bitcoin network working.

On Twitter, the Square founder shared an image of the node synchronizing with the bitcoin blockchain with the caption: "Running #bitcoin."

Tesla's bitcoin investment is being looked at as a historic moment the history of the cryptocurrency to date.

"This moment will likely be looked upon in years to come as a genuine tipping point," Dermot O'Riordan, partner at the blockchain-focused private-equity firm Eden Block, told Insider. "Elon and Tesla's support legitimizes crypto and opens up bitcoin to a whole new class of retail and institutional investors. Now it seems all of Wall Street is in bed with this industry - if they weren't paying attention before, they are now."

Shares of Square traded at $258.15 at 3:30PM E.T. on Monday. Bitcoin surged to news highs on Monday morning, topping $44,000.