Matthew Siegel, head of digital asset research at prominent investment firm VanEck, He believes This Block (formerly Square) could be the first Bitcoin holder to appear on the major S&P 500 stock market index.

There are several criteria that stocks must meet in order to be eligible for listing. First of all, the market capitalization of this company must be higher than $18 billion. Second, the share of equity owned by public sector investors must be higher than 10%. Third, the company should have been profitable in the last quarter while also enjoying the previous four quarters in the green in terms of GAAP earnings.

Some additional requirements include having high liquidity and being based in the United States

“The block has achieved the latest benchmarks (earnings) after Q1 2024 earnings. However, S&P 500 inclusion is not a strictly defined matter but is determined at the discretion of the index committee,” he said.

Block initially purchased $50 million worth of Bitcoin in October 2020 before purchasing another $170 million in February 2021.

CEO Jack Dorsey, also known as the former head of Twitter (now X), is known as a long-time supporter of Bitcoin.

Other crypto contenders

As reported by U.Today, MicroStrategy (MSTR), a leading Bitcoin company, was recently added to the high-tech Nasdaq-100 index.

However, MSTR is unlikely to become part of the S&P 500 anytime soon despite its impressive advance in 2024.

Eric Balchunas, senior ETF analyst at Bloomberg, recently opinion The S&P 500 Inclusion Committee may prevent the stock from being added even if it ends up qualifying.

As reported by U.Today, Bitwise expects Coinbase to be included in the S&P 500 index this year. However, Sigel admits that such a choice would be more controversial for the commission than for Block Inc, given that Coinbase is a cryptocurrency company.