Why Sea Limited Stock Rocketed Up Today

Key Points

• Sea beat revenue expectations but missed on the bottom line.

• Investors appeared to cheer the top-line beat, as the company's three businesses all continue to grow strongly in a profitable manner.

• Management also called out several key milestones in each business, especially the new market of Brazil.

• 10 stocks we like better than Sea Limited ›

Shares of Southeast Asian super-app company Sea Limited (NYSE: SE) had rocketed 20.5% higher on Tuesday as of 12:30 p.m.

Sea reported earnings this morning that, while missing estimates on the bottom line, trounced estimates for revenue growth, with strength across all three of its businesses. As a high-growth stock, that top-line strength appears to be what investors care about most.

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Sea fires on all cylinders

In the second quarter, Sea saw revenue rally 38.2% to $5.3 billion, while earnings per share of $0.65 missed expectations by $0.04. Still, Sea was profitable across its three businesses encompassing mobile games, e-commerce, and digital finance.

In e-commerce, revenue was up 33.7% on gross market value (GMV) growth of 28.2%, while segment EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization) flipped from a $9.2 million loss a year ago to a $227.7 million profit. In digital financial services, revenue grew a whopping 70%, while adjusted EBITDA rallied 55% to $255.5 million. And in digital entertainment, which consists of mobile game publishing and Sea's self-produced hit Free Fire, bookings grew 23.2% year over year, with adjusted EBITDA up 21.6% to $368.2 million.

The combined growth resulted in whopping 364% growth in EPS, showing Sea's profitability beginning to take off from a near-breakeven level a year ago.

Image source: Getty Images.

Sea also highlighted a few big milestones. These included the eighth anniversary of Free Fire, showing off the "evergreen" nature of this game, which incredibly managed to grow bookings double-digits relative to last year. Management also said it now expects 30% bookings growth in the digital entertainment business this year, which is a massive improvement after a long hangover following the early days of the COVID pandemic.

In Shopee e-commerce, Sea also marked its fifth anniversary in Brazil, its only market outside of Southeast Asia. The company claimed in its press release that after just five years it's become the e-commerce leader in the country by order volume, which I'm sure is catching the attention of MercadoLibre (NASDAQ: MELI) investors today.

Meanwhile, Sea's digital finance arm is beginning to see more adoption outside the Shopee platform, with Malaysia seeing 40% quarter-over-quarter growth in off-Shopee SPayLater loans, now making up more than 20% of the SPayLater portfolio in the country. More penetration outside of Shopee means SeaMoney could be on its way to becoming a major economywide financial institution.

High growth at a reasonable price

With its highly profitable mobile games business having stabilized, Sea's e-commerce and finance arms are now really gaining traction, growing strongly in a profitable manner.

While Sea may seem like an expensive stock trading at 46 times this year's and 31 times 2026's earnings estimates, that's also not a totally bananas price to pay for a company that's firing on all cylinders across not one but several high-growth businesses and geographies.

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Billy Duberstein and/or his clients have positions in Sea Limited. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends MercadoLibre and Sea Limited. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.