---
title: "Analysts rate Sea Limited a buy at $149.40. Its insiders sold $538 million and bought nothing."
description: "A year of filings shows ten insiders selling and none buying, while the Street holds a $149 average target on a stock that closed at $93.77. The automated ad engine lifts revenue far faster than profit, and the only buyer with an inside view is Sea's own buyback."
publisher: "The Inference"
section: "Markets"
published: 2026-10-17T17:19:38.347Z
modified: 2026-10-17T17:19:38.347Z
canonical: https://theinference.org/article/analysts-rate-sea-limited-a-buy-at-149-40-its-insiders-sold-538-million-and-bought-nothing
language: en
keywords: "Sea Limited, Insider Trading, Analyst Ratings, Stocks, E-commerce, AI Monetization"
---

# Analysts rate Sea Limited a buy at $149.40. Its insiders sold $538 million and bought nothing.

> A year of filings shows ten insiders selling and none buying, while the Street holds a $149 average target on a stock that closed at $93.77. The automated ad engine lifts revenue far faster than profit, and the only buyer with an inside view is Sea's own buyback.

[Sea Limited](https://theinference.org/markets/companies/sea), the Singapore group behind the Shopee marketplace, the Monee lending arm and the Garena games business, closed at $93.77 on October 16 [2]. That same week the research firm Zacks [moved the stock off Strong Sell to Hold](https://www.thelincolnianonline.com/2026/10/14/sea-nysese-upgraded-to-hold-at-zacks-research.html), ten analysts rate it a Buy, and the average target across the Street is $149.40 [1].

The people who run [Sea](https://www.sec.gov/cgi-bin/browse-edgar?action=getcompany&CIK=0001703399) have been answering with their own money, in one direction only. The stock-data service GuruFocus [counts $538 million of insider sales over the past twelve months and no purchases at all](https://www.gurufocus.com/news/9128376/sea-ltd-se-shares-fall-38-what-gf-score-of-76-tells-investors) [2]. In a year of Form 4s, the ownership filing insiders must sign for each trade, no Sea officer or director shows up as a buyer [2].

## The ad machine works; the profit has not caught up

Shopee's advertising is now bought largely by machine: [since July 2025 the GMV Max system has bid for most sellers automatically](https://www.techtimes.com/articles/323995/20260811/sea-limited-q2-2026-shopee-ad-revenue-grew-37-points-faster-commerce-volume.htm) [3]. Last quarter core marketplace revenue, transaction fees plus advertising, grew 66% [3]. The volume of goods sold grew only 28% [3].

That spread is the take rate, the share of each sale the platform keeps, widening under automation [3]. It has not reached the bottom line. In the June quarter earnings per share came in at $0.70 against a $0.86 consensus [1], a miss TechTimes puts down largely to a jump in income tax expense [3]. Twelve quarters show the shape:

*Chart: **Revenue has more than doubled in twelve quarters; net income stays a sliver** Line chart of Sea's quarterly revenue and net income from Q3 2023 to Q2 2026, showing revenue more than doubling while net income stays a small fraction*

*Quarterly GAAP revenue and net income, US$ billions, from Sea's SEC filings, Q3 2023 through Q2 2026. [4]*

## Ten sellers, and the filings still arrive in bunches

The market-data tracker MarketBeat [counts ten Sea insiders selling over the past twelve months, none buying, for a combined $430 million](https://www.marketbeat.com/stocks/NYSE/SE/insider-trades/) [5]. Its tally sits below GuruFocus's $538 million, a gap that likely reflects the two services counting different transactions as sales [2]. After a year of it, insiders own 0.22% of the company [5].

The roster runs to the top. [Gang Ye](https://theinference.org/markets/people/gang-ye), the chief operating officer, has filed sale blocks almost every week since March [6]. [Xiaodong Li](https://theinference.org/markets/people/xiaodong-li), Sea's founder, chairman and chief executive, sold about $137 million of stock on August 11, earnings day, cutting his reported stake by close to half [6].

## Forty filings in seven weeks

[The SEC's EDGAR database logged forty Sea Form 4s between August 27 and October 15](https://www.sec.gov/cgi-bin/browse-edgar?action=getcompany&CIK=0001703399&type=4&dateb=&owner=include&count=40) [7]. The newest shows chief compliance officer and general counsel [Yanjun Wang](https://theinference.org/markets/people/yanjun-wang) selling 2,000 shares across October 13 and 14 at about $95.90, [under a trading plan adopted on March 26](https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1703399/000119312526422215/0001193125-26-422215-index.htm) [8]. He still holds more than a million shares [8].

## The plans explain the timing, not the year

The honest objection is that much of this selling runs through Rule 10b5-1 plans, sale schedules set months in advance, and some through option exercises [6][8]. That explains why a sale lands on a given Tuesday. It does not explain ten sellers and no buyers in a year when the shares fell 42% [2].

Two months ago the standard read was benign: the Motley Fool called the selling "preset plans executing into one of its best quarters" [9]. The shares have since given back the whole post-earnings move and more [2].

## The only inside bid is the company's own

One account with an inside view has been buying: Sea itself, which [spent $417 million on its own shares in the June quarter under its buyback program](https://www.stocktitan.net/news/SE/sea-limited-reports-second-quarter-2026-hnyva894m8wm.html) [10]. Shareholder cash is absorbing what the officers sell, quarter after quarter.

*Chart: **One quarter of buybacks nearly matches a year of insider selling** Column chart comparing a year of insider selling in Sea shares, $538 million by GuruFocus's count and $430 million by MarketBeat's, with the $417 million Sea spent buying back its own shares in the June quarter*

*Insider sales over the twelve months to mid-October 2026 as counted by GuruFocus and MarketBeat, against Sea's June-quarter share repurchases. Sources: GuruFocus, MarketBeat, Sea's second-quarter 2026 results. [2][5][10]*

The automation inside this business is working, in the way an ad engine run by machine should: revenue growing far faster than the volume of goods sold [3]. What has not arrived is profit that keeps pace, or one dollar of an executive's own money at these prices.

An analyst's price target is a forecast about next year. A Form 4 records a trade that already happened, at a price an insider accepted. The first insider purchase in more than a year would say more than every target on the Street, and until one appears, the ledger is the cleaner read on who believes the AI monetization story.

## Takeaway

Ten Sea insiders sold $538 million over twelve months and not one bought, while the Street's $149.40 average target sits 59% above the $93.77 close. Revenue grows faster than profit, and the only inside bid is Sea's own $417 million buyback.

## Sources

1. [The Lincolnian Online, "SEA (NYSE:SE) Upgraded to 'Hold' at Zacks Research", 14 October 2026](https://www.thelincolnianonline.com/2026/10/14/sea-nysese-upgraded-to-hold-at-zacks-research.html)
2. [GuruFocus News, "Sea Ltd (SE) Shares Fall 3.8%: What GF Score of 76 Tells Investors", 16 October 2026](https://www.gurufocus.com/news/9128376/sea-ltd-se-shares-fall-38-what-gf-score-of-76-tells-investors)
3. [TechTimes, "Sea Limited Q2 2026: Shopee Ad Revenue Grew 37 Points Faster Than Commerce Volume", 11 August 2026](https://www.techtimes.com/articles/323995/20260811/sea-limited-q2-2026-shopee-ad-revenue-grew-37-points-faster-commerce-volume.htm)
4. [Sea, quarterly figures from its SEC filings, retrieved 17 October 2026](https://www.sec.gov/cgi-bin/browse-edgar?action=getcompany&CIK=0001703399)
5. [MarketBeat, "SEA (SE) Insider Buying and Selling Activity", retrieved 17 October 2026](https://www.marketbeat.com/stocks/NYSE/SE/insider-trades/)
6. [OpenInsider, "SE, Sea Ltd, SEC Form 4 Insider Trading Screener", retrieved 17 October 2026](http://openinsider.com/search?q=se)
7. [SEC EDGAR, Sea Ltd Form 4 filing list, retrieved 17 October 2026](https://www.sec.gov/cgi-bin/browse-edgar?action=getcompany&CIK=0001703399&type=4&dateb=&owner=include&count=40)
8. [SEC Form 4, Yanjun Wang (CCO and GC), Sea Ltd, filed 15 October 2026](https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1703399/000119312526422215/0001193125-26-422215-index.htm)
9. [The Motley Fool via Yahoo Finance, "Sea Limited Insiders Trimmed Into a Strong Quarter. Here's What to Know", 15 August 2026](https://finance.yahoo.com/markets/stocks/articles/sea-limited-insiders-trimmed-strong-184727744.html)
10. [Sea Limited press release, "Sea Limited Reports Second Quarter 2026 Results", via StockTitan, 11 August 2026](https://www.stocktitan.net/news/SE/sea-limited-reports-second-quarter-2026-hnyva894m8wm.html)


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Analysts rate Sea Limited a buy at $149.40. Its insiders sold $538 million and bought nothing. — The Inference. Canonical: https://theinference.org/article/analysts-rate-sea-limited-a-buy-at-149-40-its-insiders-sold-538-million-and-bought-nothing