China Mobile Ltd, the country's largest telecom service provider, reported a 3.1 percent rise in nine-month net profit on Thursday helped by a growing subscriber base.
Net profit rose to 88.1 billion yuan ($13.08 billion) for the January-September period, while revenue climbed 4.3 percent to 542.7 billion yuan, China Mobile said in a filing to the Hong Kong stock exchange.
China Mobile said it added 168 million 4G customers in the first three quarters, bringing its 4G subscribers to 481 million.
It said handset data traffic rose 131 percent from a year earlier due to its improving 4G business.
Average revenue per user (ARPU) of its mobile business, a key industry bellwether of performance, increased 1.7 percent from a year earlier to 60 yuan.
The announcement came after markets closed. China Mobile's Hong Kong shares ended 0.92 percent lower, underperforming Hong Kong's benchmark Hang Seng Index, which rose 0.3 percent.
On Wednesday smaller rival China Unicom said it was expecting its profit to plunge 80 percent to 1.6 billion yuan, partly due to higher expenses for sales and marketing in a fight to attract subscribers to its fourth-generation (4G) network.
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