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(Bloomberg) -- Sea Ltd. plummeted after reporting a surprise loss in the third quarter, hit by intensifying competition from Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. and ByteDance Ltd. on its home turf.

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The stock fell 22% in New York trading — wiping out about $6 billion in market value — after the company posted a net loss of $149 million, compared with a profit of $322 million the previous quarter. Analysts had estimated the e-commerce and gaming company would report a profit of about $100 million.

Chief Executive Officer Forrest Li told investors in a call after results he believes the company should invest heavily now to build scale in its online retail arm Shopee, amid competition from ByteDance’s TikTok, Alibaba’s Lazada and PDD Holdings Inc.’s Temu. Sacrificing short-term profit will help the business in the future, he said.

“The entrance of new players has intensified competition in our market,” Li said, without naming the entrants. “Investing in market share again now will position us better.”

Sea Plunges as Adjusted Ebitda Misses Estimates: Street Wrap

Sea did beat analysts’ projections for revenue growth. Sales rose 4.9% in the quarter to $3.3 billion, versus the average estimate of $3.2 billion.

Till recently, Sea’s strongest markets including Indonesia seemed under siege from TikTok and a new breed of video-oriented shopping services, which used popular influencers to sell a range of wares to an engaged, growing online population. But in September, Jakarta effectively forced TikTok to shut its shopping service, acting on a growing backlash from smaller merchants against the Chinese-owned platform.

Investors have been looking for clues since then on whether that abrupt exit will rekindle Sea. Before Indonesia, the market feared the Singaporean company — which reported more than a decade of losses after its 2009 founding — will sink back into the red. Compounding the situation are expectations that Southeast Asia’s internet economy will log its slowest growth on record this year, the result of an economic downturn with uncertain outcomes.

“Given competition remains intense and dynamic, we caution that if the aggressive spend pattern persists longer, it could further drag on profitability timing of Shopee,” Citigroup Inc. analysts including Alicia Yap wrote in a research note.