Block acquires Afterpay Limited

Block acquired Afterpay Limited for approximately US$29 billion implied at announcement (all-stock); final accounting consideration of $13.9 billion (113,387,895 Class A shares) at close, a transaction completed in January 2022, structured as all stock.

Afterpay Limited operates in Square (Seller) and Cash App ecosystems - buy now, pay later, is based in Headquartered in Melbourne, Australia (ASX: APT); global BNPL operations, had revenue of about Afterpay full-year 2021 GMV of $19.7 billion (up 74% YoY); revenue grew approximately 71% YoY and gross profit approximately 75% YoY (per Block Q4 2021 earnings commentary). Afterpay is a pioneering global 'buy now, pay later' (BNPL) platform that lets retail merchants offer customers the ability to buy goods and services and split purchases across four interest-free installments. At the end of 2021 Afterpay had more than 122,000 annual active merchants and more than 19 million annual active consumers, and delivered $19.7 billion in GMV for full-year 2021, up 74% year over year.

Square stated the acquisition aims to enable the companies to better deliver compelling financial products and services that expand access to more consumers and drive incremental revenue for merchants of all sizes, integrating Afterpay across the Seller and Cash App ecosystems so merchants can offer BNPL at checkout and consumers can manage installments inside Cash App.

Afterpay brought a fast-growing global BNPL network of 122,000+ merchants and 19M+ consumers that could be connected across Square's Seller ecosystem and Cash App's consumer base. Integration to let sellers of all sizes offer BNPL at checkout, give Afterpay consumers the ability to manage installments directly in Cash App, and give Cash App customers the ability to discover sellers and BNPL offers within the app. Integrated into Block's existing Square (Seller) and Cash App ecosystems; Afterpay co-founders/co-CEOs Nick Molnar and Anthony Eisen joined Block to help lead the respective seller and consumer businesses. Block Q4 2021 earnings call (Feb 2022): "We completed the acquisition of Afterpay on January 31, 2022. Since we announced the transaction in early August, our teams have been focused on closing the transaction and planning for the sizable integration of our two companies... on day one, we executed on a meaningful integration... we believe Afterpay will accelerate the connections between our Square and Cash ecosystems."