Block (ASX:XYZ) determined that certain minerals in its hardware products may have originated in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and/or any of its adjoining countries, and therefore exercised due diligence on the source and chain of custody of the minerals, according to a Wednesday Australian bourse filing.
It made an initial determination that these products contain components with metallic forms of tin, tungsten, tantalum, and/or gold minerals, derived from columbite-tantalite, cassiterite, gold, wolframite, collectively referred to in the filing as "conflict minerals."
Its primary hardware products include its magstripe reader, contactless and chip reader, Square Stand, Square Register, Square Terminal, Bitkey, and Proto Rig, which are manufactured by third parties.
It then conducted a "Reasonable Country of Origin Inquiry." The firm asked its direct suppliers, representing its contract manufacturers during the applicable period, to respond to the "Conflict Minerals Reporting Template," a standardized reporting template developed by the Responsible Minerals Initiative.
According to the responses, some of the minerals used in its products might not have been exclusively sourced from scrap or recycled material, and may have originated in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and/or any of its adjoining countries.