It’s wild to think that Taiwan — despite having just 23 million people — remains $SE Shopee’s second-largest market by GMV.
Taiwan alone contributed $20B+ GMV in 2024, which is approximately 20% of Shopee’s overall GMV.
The top 3 markets of $SE Shopee in 2024:
- Indonesia: ~$26B
- Taiwan: ~$22B
- Brazil: ~$11B
Brazil’s GDP is 50% larger than Indonesia’s, so it has the potential to overtake both and become Shopee’s top market in the future.
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What’s even more surprising is the gap between Taiwan’s real eCommerce activity and official stats.
Our government estimates the 2024 eCommerce market at just $21B, with a penetration rate of 13.5%. These numbers are widely cited — but misleading.
In contrast, earlier government reports from 2017 estimated Taiwan’s eCommerce at over $40B (with $25B from B2C). So what happened?
If you read the fine print, the current stats exclude transactions on marketplaces like Shopee. 🤦♂️
This is a classic case of outdated or flawed metrics, something all too common in developing countries.
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Unfortunately, this kind of underreporting may be one reason Shopee Taiwan has been ignore by the public.
Zack Zhu@the_zack_zhu
Did $SE investor knows that in 2017, Taiwan contribute more than half of the Shopee's GMV? Taiwan was Shopee first best market! Historically speaking, management team rarely talks about Taiwan despite Taiwan is still Shopee's second biggest market by GMV and the most profitable ones. They don't talk about Taiwan for two reasons. 1) Taiwan only got 23M population, it's a very small market population wise. It's not good for capital markets. 2) They are super dominant in Taiwan, monopolies don't talk about how dominant they are, especially when they got Chinese link that might irritate Taiwanese government politically. Should I talk more about Taiwan eCommerce Market more? ( Taiwan order size is estimate to be 2~3x higher than SEA)
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