Block’s Cash App Rolls Out Service to Automate Getting Paid in Bitcoin

Cash App, the mobile payment service developed by Jack Dorsey’s Block, Inc. (SQ), announced that they are rolling out three new services at the Bitcoin 2022 conference in Miami on Thursday.

Cash App is also providing support for URIs, or Unified QRs that are enabled by BIP 21. URIs allow for the generaization of address types so that users don’t have to think about the correct address type – either on-chain or Lightning Network payments – to use to send and receive bitcoin. With this upgrade, Cash App users can opt in to not having to choose between address types.

Cash App announced that tennis star Serena Williams is partnering with the company, but declined to provide specific details. She follows a string of major sports stars that have signed partnerships and endorsements with crypto firms, including Tom Brady and Steph Curry with FTX and LeBron James with Crypto.com.

Cash App integrated Lightning Network in January, which paved the road for consumers to easily use bitcoin at point-of-sale. Cash App also remains a popular avenue for buying bitcoin after it was the first public company to allow for bitcoin purchases in 2018.

Miles Suter, Cash App’s crypto product lead who gave the presentation at Bitcoin 2022, said that the goal of Cash App was to redefine the world’s relationship with money and bitcoin, aiming to get bitcoin in the hands of as many people as possible.