There was perhaps no bigger poster child for the pandemic boom-and-bust cycle than Sea Limited (NYSE: SE). During that time, the Southeast Asian "super-app" rode massive growth across its stay-at-home portfolio of e-commerce, gaming, and fintech businesses. Yet as the pandemic faded and inflation rose, the profitable gaming division, led by global hit Free Fire, declined, sending Sea deeper into companywide operating losses.

As a result, Sea's stock plunged nearly 90% at one point from its 2021 peak to last October's lows.

Management responded by aggressively cutting costs and scaling back Sea's geographical ambitions to focus on its core markets. And after a year of painful cutting, Sea posted a surprise first-time profit in the fourth quarter last year.

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Source Fool.com