China's telecom sector posts slower expansion in Q1

BEIJING - China's telecom sector recorded slower revenue growth in the first quarter of 2019, but mobile internet traffic continued to surge, official data showed.

The sector's revenue rose 1 percent year-on-year to 332.3 billion yuan ($49.3 billion) in Q1, according to a report from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT).

The growth was down 4.1 percentage points from that in the same period of last year and down 0.9 percentage points from the January-February period this year.

Despite the overall slower expansion, mobile internet traffic soared 129 percent year-on-year to 25.6 billion gigabytes in Q1, reflecting robust mobile data consumption in the country.

Mobile phone users subscribing to China's three major telecom operators neared 1.6 billion by the end of March, up 8.6 percent year-on-year, according to the MIIT.