Square down in after-hours trading after reporting mixed earnings

Square reported mixed quarterly earnings. The company posted $3.16B in fourth quarter net revenue and an adjusted earnings per share of $.32, compared to estimates of $3.22B in revenue and $.24 in expected earnings per share. Yahoo Finance's Emily McCormick joined Yahoo Finance Live to break down the key metrics.

Video Transcript

SEANA SMITH: Some breaking news-- Square is out with its earnings report. Shares off just around 2 and 1/2%. Emily McCormick has those numbers for us. Emily.

EMILY MCCORMICK: Seana, we're taking a look here at a mixed report from Square. That company reporting a miss on the top line, with fourth quarter net revenue coming in at $3.16 billion. That was below estimates for $3.22 billion, but again, big growth that we're still seeing from Square on a year over year basis. Now I want to highlight that the company did beat expectations on the bottom line. Those adjusted earnings per share coming in at $0.32 versus the $0.24 expected.

But the big headline from today's press release is that Square has now bought about 3,318 Bitcoin for $170 million. So that company is increasing its investment in Bitcoin. It had purchased $50 million worth of Bitcoin back in October. And what the company said in its press release is, quote, "The investment is part of Square's ongoing commitment to Bitcoin and the company plans to assess its aggregate investment in Bitcoin relative to its other investments on an ongoing basis," end quote.

Now, just taking a look at these results, Bitcoin revenue during the fourth quarter was $1.76 billion. That's really gleaned from when the company takes a bit of the transactions from Bitcoin for users on its Cash App. That did come in a bit light compared to the $1.87 billion that had been expected in Bitcoin revenue. And again, we are seeing shares of Square off about 2% in late trading. , This is a stock that has been up about 200% over the past year so some high expectations heading into these results, Seana and Adam.

SEANA SMITH: I'm sure analysts are going to have a couple of questions for CEO Jack Dorsey about that Bitcoin purchase on the earnings call. That's expected to get underway later on this afternoon.