Shopee parent Sea Group’s Q2 2025 results, released on Tue 12 Aug 2025, obviously excited the investors.
With quarterly net income quintupling YoY to US$418.2 million, Sea Group (NYSE:SE) stock price rose 19.07% by the end of the trading day.
As usual, we’ll skip the boilerplate numbers you can find in media and analyst reports – and share 15 of our own observations instead:
Monee’s lending engine keeps accelerating
- Sea’s digital financial services arm, Monee, again delivered exceptional growth. Loanbook (“loan principal outstanding”) reached US$6.9 billion at the end of Q2, implying annualised disbursements likely exceeded US$25 billion — roughly a quarter of Shopee’s GMV.
- The earnings report also highlighted the surge in “off-Shopee loans” — cash loans and BNPL originated outside the Shopee platform. With a NPL 90+ ratio of just 1%, Monee’s operational discipline and risk control capabilities are on full display.
- Malaysia joined Indonesia and Thailand as the third Monee market with a loanbook above US$1 billion. The absence of the Philippines in the top ranks – despite its strong consumer credit demand – is intriguing. What’s holding it back?
Shopee’s take rate creeps up
- Shopee’s take rate rose from 12.3% in Q1 to 12.6% in Q2, and looks set to climb further in Q3, judging by on-the-ground policy changes in competitive markets like Thailand. This extra margin will help Shopee bankroll campaigns against TikTok Shop.
TikTok Shop: Still a Threat?
- TikTok Shop GMV in H1 2025 grew 93% – 150% across the five largest Southeast Asian markets, according to the Momentum Works – Tabcut joint report (complimentary copy here).
- J&T Express delivered 3.2 billion parcels in Southeast Asia in H1 2025 – up 58% from 2 billion a year ago. We believe much of this growth came from TikTok Shop orders.
- You can run your own numbers on TikTok Shop’s relative market share vs. Shopee – particularly in Thailand, Vietnam, and Indonesia, where Shopee is working hard to defend its lead.
- Yet ByteDance remains notably quiet on TikTok Shop’s real strategy for Southeast Asia. Is there a defined endgame, or is ROI-focused growth the mantra for 2025? (More in our recently released Ecommerce in Southeast Asia 2025 report.).
- In the earnings call, none of the analysts asked about competition in Southeast Asia. This is interesting.
Analysts’ eyes focused on Brazil
- Instead, four analysts asked about Brazil, where Shopee claims to be the top ecommerce player by order volume.
- Brazil’s ecommerce market is heating up:
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- Temu is growing exceptionally rapidly from a small base;
- TikTok Shop launched in May – Sea management said they “have been quite familiar with their business”;
- SHEIN has rolled out its marketplace model, more successfully than in other markets;
- MercadoLivre (Meli) is expanding free shipping, sacrificing margins for market share.
- Will Meituan’s Keeta, which is set to launch food delivery in Brazil in October, join the fray with a quick commerce launch as well?
- On the lending side, Brazil offers fertile ground. Nubank and Meli have built large, successful consumer credit businesses, and – as Sea’s management noted – the abundance of external credit data makes risk assessment easier than in Shopee’s Asian markets.
Logistics: SPX and FBS push forward
- SPX Express, Shopee’s logistics arm, continues its expansion (see our recent comments to Bloomberg here). This quarter, Shopee is also aggressively pushing Fulfilled by Shopee (FBS) to sellers.
Final note
- The word “Momentum” was mentioned 12 times during the earnings call. We approve.
You can also make reference to the following Momentum Works reports for more:
