Twitter and Square CEO Jack Dorsey said on Tuesday he is taking $1 billion in equity out of Square to help fund “global COVID-19 relief.”
Dorsey tweeted the amount represents about 28% of his net worth. The funds, which will be distributed through his new Start Small LLC, will be tracked on a Google Doc that Dorsey shared alongside his announcement.
“After we disarm this pandemic,” Dorsey tweeted, “the focus will shift to girl’s health and education, and UBI,” or universal basic income, as made famous by former Democratic nominee Andrew Yang.
I’m moving $1B of my Square equity (~28% of my wealth) to #startsmall LLC to fund global COVID-19 relief. After we disarm this pandemic, the focus will shift to girl’s health and education, and UBI. It will operate transparently, all flows tracked here: https://t.co/hVkUczDQmz
— jack (@jack) April 7, 2020
Square’s stock dipped about 2% in early after-hours trading.
Dorsey’s $1 billion commitment makes him the latest tech exec to back up the Brinks truck to fight COVID-19. Last week, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos donated $100 million to U.S. food banks helping feed out-of-work Americans. Facebook chief Mark Zuckerberg, along with his wife Priscilla Chan, donated $25 million to finding a coronavirus treatment, while Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates said he’ll be spending billions of dollars to create factories for developing a vaccine.
“Why now? The needs are increasingly urgent, and I want to see the impact in my lifetime,” Dorsey said in a follow-up tweet. “I hope this inspires others to do something similar. Life is too short, so let’s do everything we can today to help people now.”
