The Singapore-based company, Sea Limited’s e-commerce segment was reported to have told their employees that Shopee was shutting down operations in Latin American markets such as Argentina, Mexico, Colombia and Chile.
Specifically, Shopee will still maintain cross-border operations in Chile, Colombia, and Mexico meanwhile will leave Argentine market entirely.
The presence of Shopee in Brazil has become a dominant player, therefore the Brazilian market will not be affected.
According to Reuters’ news report, Shopee Chief Executive Chris Feng wrote to employees that “in light of the current elevated macro uncertainty,” the company needed to “focus resources on core operations” and had decided to concentrate on a cross-border model in Shopee Mexico, Colombia and Chile.
Shopee confirmed in a statement to Reuters that it would “concentrate on a cross-border model in Mexico, Colombia and Chile, and close in Argentina.”
To recap, during the pandemic the market value of Sea Ltd spiked to more than US$200 billion last October as its gaming and e-commerce units surged in popularity. With the nations entered into normalisation phase, Sea Ltd saw its share prices tumbling down and are now worth just US$27 billion.
