Block said it will cut 40 percent of its work force, and about 4,000 employees are expected to lose their jobs.
The company that owns Square, Cash App and Tidal made the announcement in a social media post by its top executive, Jack Dorsey.
The cuts came as Block reported strong financial results for its most recent quarter, the announcement said, and company leaders framed the move around new tools.
Mr. Dorsey wrote that he wanted to act decisively rather than "cut gradually over months or years as this shift plays out," as reported by the article.
He also said, as reported, that intelligence tools paired with smaller and flatter teams are enabling a new way of working that is accelerating rapidly.
The report described the decision as perhaps the most striking example so far of a technology company planning to eliminate employees because of A.I.
Reactions And Implications
Investors embraced the announcement and Block's share price jumped more than 26 percent in after-hours trading, the report said.
At the same time, the coverage noted that Mr. Dorsey's post is likely to make rank-and-file tech workers at other companies nervous about their future.
The company tied the layoffs directly to gains from intelligence tools and a move toward smaller, flatter teams, framing the change as strategic rather than solely cost cutting.
The combination of strong quarterly results and the emphasis on A.I. underscored a striking contrast between investor reaction and the scale of workforce reduction described in the report.
