By Patrick Chu


Block Inc. shares dropped 7% to $134.98 Tuesday after the payments company formerly known as Square Inc. disclosed an internal data breach at its Cash App Investing operation.

Late Monday, Block Inc. said in a securities filing that its own investigation found a former employee downloaded reports without Block's permission. The information from some of its U.S. brokerage customers included full names, brokerage-account numbers, portfolio value and holdings, and stock-trading activity. The reports were accessed on Dec. 10, Block said.

Cash App Investing enables its customers to buy and sell stocks and bitcoin.

The San Francisco-based company said it contacted 8.2 million current and former customers about the incident, and informed financial regulators and law enforcement.

The investigation hasn't been completed, but so far Block said the reports accessed by the former employee didn't contain identifiable information such as user names, passwords, Social Security numbers, birth dates, payment-card information, customer addresses and bank-account balances.


Write to Patrick Chu at Patrick.Chu@WSJ.com


(END) Dow Jones Newswires

04-05-22 1316ET