Thread by @juliey4

$SE with another amazing quarter this morning, honestly this is starting to get boring 😂

stock is up ~10% as of the time of writing this 🎉

Overall FY 2020:
- GAAP revenue $4.4 bil, up 101% YoY
- Gross profit $1.3 bil, up 123% YoY
- Adj EBITDA $107mm, ($178mm for FY 2019)

Garena Q4 2020:
- Bookings $1 bil, up 111% YoY
- Adj EBITDA $664mm, up 149% YoY
- QAUs was 610.6 mm, up 72% YoY
- Quarterly paying users was 73 million, up ~120% YoY (representing 12% of QAUs… compared to 9.4% for the same period in 2019)

Free Fire:
- Free Fire was the most downloaded game globally for 2020, for the second year in a row
- Free Fire was the highest grossing mobile game in LATAM, Sea, and India

When asked about user growth in gaming, $SE mgmt pointed to global diversification, noting that LATAM now contributes the largest share of rev. Also noted increased growth in India.

On Garena / Free Fire:

"Last quarter we reached more than 570mm QAUs, and then in fourth quarter we had more than 600mm. So we are seeing positive user growth across all our regions."

The $SE team discussed the importance of Free Fire's longevity and noted that the improvement in margins is mainly attributable to the fact that FF is self-developed. they noted that they are interested in more self developed games as well as publishing other IP.

Shopee Q4 2020:
- GAAP rev $842mm, up 178% YoY
- GMV was $11.9 bil, up 112% YoY
- In Indonesia: daily average of 4.7mm orders, up 128%+ YoY
- Shopee #1 in Shopping by MAUs and time spent in SEA
- Shopee was the #3 most downloaded app globally in the Shopping category in 2020

when asked about Shopee growth across different regions, the $SE team said they are experiencing high growth rates in areas where they are already established (Indo) and areas where they are newer due to Covid (Philippines)

When asked abt $SE Shopee take rates in diff areas:

"It is a dynamic process. We look at the condition, the time period, and the ecosystem to decide how best to manage take rate. over time, we think we can move to a higher rate at a high single or double digit range."

there was Q about improving take rate in order to break even, and $SE noted that this not actually necessary to break even:

"we can break even now if we wanted to... our investment in growth is really by choice and is according to the pace that is suitable too each market"

"For example, Taiwan is the first market where we broke even and we achieved a healthy EBIDTA margin there. But take rate in Taiwan is not the highest" $SE #shopee

Sea Money:
- Mobile wallet TPV was $2.9 bil for the quarter and $7.8 billion for the full year 2020
- Quarterly paying users in Indo reached 10mm+ this quarter
- Expanded partnership with Google to integrate digital wallet with Google Play

$SE mgmt attributed the strong growth of Sea Money to Shopee's increased dominance. "We already saw strong adoption as demonstrated by our paying user ratio and TPV growth. We will continue to drive efficient growth thru the Shopee user base and expand to third party merchants"

probably the most interesting part of the call was the launch of Sea Capital (!)
- $SE acquired an investment firm called Composite Capital, its founder will lead Sea Capital
- Sea will allocate an initial $1 bil to be deployed by Sea Capital over the next few years

Sea Capital shows that $SE is continuing to play the long-game, and also speaks to their admiration for $TCEHY:

"We think it is important for a global internet company to have these capabilities in the longer run."

all in all, nothing out of the ordinary with today's call outside of Sea Capital. very exciting stuff and it will be fun to watch how $SE continues to balance and execute on all of these high-growth initiatives 🔥