Jakarta, CNBC Indonesia – Sea Group Chief Executive Officer Forrest Li sent bad news to his employees. He said the company had experienced a $150 billion (Rp 2,145 trillion) decline in its valuation since the end of 2021 and that was very painful.
The memo marked the company’s third decline in value, and the biggest drop in stock. Sea is the parent of e-commerce Shopee and developer Garena.
“This downturn is painful and you may feel frustrated, discouraged or worried about the future of Sea,” he said in the memo seen by Bloomberg News.
“Don’t be afraid: we are in a strong position internally and we have a clear next step. This is a short-term pain that we must endure to truly maximize our long-term potential”.
Global investors have long been satisfied with the company’s performance. In the end let Sea run his business. From 2017 to 2021, Sea’s share price on the United States stock exchange has increased by 2,300%.
But that has changed since November, when a disappointing quarterly report sparked profit-taking. The sell-off accelerated further in January, when the company announced it would sell some of its shares. This was further exacerbated by India’s ban in February.
According to reports, Sea has lost three-quarters of the company’s value in just five months.
After these disappointing results, Forrest Li was finally much more open about the events at his company. Shareholder Kelvin Seetoh said this was due to the drop in share prices.
“If it weren’t for the same price drop, Sea probably wouldn’t have revealed so many metrics. They could have done this to allow investors to understand their business better and it’s not too late,” said Seetoh, co-founder of investor group 10X Capital.
The employees also demanded to know more information. During a recent webinar, there were many Shopee employees who wanted to hear from analysts who had no relationship with the company.
According to a number of sources, this is also a matter of internal debate as to how much the company should be more open to the public.
(npb/roy)
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