Afterpay owner Block wants to cut almost half of its workforce, citing AI

Jack Dorsey’s payments giant Block will cut more than 4,000 jobs – nearly half of its global workforce – in what the company described as a deliberate move toward becoming an “intelligence-based” business, sending share prices up more than 22 percent in after-hours trading.

The cuts reduce Block’s global workforce from more than 10,000 employees to just under 6,000, making it one of the largest AI-driven workforce cuts to date.

Block, which acquired Melbourne-based buy now, pay later platform Afterpay for about $39 billion in 2022, has a large presence in Australia, but the exact number of local employees affected remains…