China Mobile ups payout as profit grows to 80.2b yuan

Melody Chen

China Mobile's (0941) first-half net profit grew 5.3 percent to 80.2 billion yuan (HK$87.1 billion) over a year earlier and increased its interim dividend by 7 percent to HK$2.6 apiece.

Operating revenue in the first six months of this year was 546.7 billion yuan, up 3 percent from last year, with telecommunications services contributing 463.6 billion yuan, up 2.5 percent year-on-year.

Digital transformation revenue recorded 147.1 billion yuan, up 11 percent year-on-year, contributing 31.7 percent of telecommunications services revenue, an increase of 2.4 percentage points.

Chairman Yang Jie said this year's profit, which will be distributed in cash as a percentage of the net profit, will further increase from that of 2023.

Total connections, including mobile phones, wireline broadband, Internet of Things cards, home devices and industry devices, surpassed 3.5 billion with a net increase of 150 million.

The world's largest mobile operator said the evolving external environment and weak demand have been challenging, clouding its business transformation with uncertainty during the shift between old and new growth drivers.

Mobile service revenue reached 255.2 billion yuan over the first half of the year. Mobile customers exceeded one billion, including 514 million 5G customers, accounting for 51.4 percent of the customer base.

The average monthly revenue per user for mobile services was 51 yuan.

Internet network revenue climbed 7.5 percent from the previous year to 69.8 billion yuan.

Wireline broadband customers totaled 309 million, of which 272 million were household broadband customers.

The operator generated 112 billion yuan from the business market, a 7.3 percent year-on-year increase, with a corporate customer base of 30.38 million and an 18.4 percent share of contracts won in open tenders.

Meanwhile, revenue from the new market surged 13.2 percent to 26.6 billion yuan and international business revenue reached 11.8 billion yuan, up 16.3 percent year-on-year.

China Mobile's free cash flow amounted to 67.4 billion yuan and capital expenditure totaled 64 billion yuan.