China Telecom (China Telecom) released its 2025 annual results, reporting resilient top-line growth, margin expansion and a higher cash-return policy while accelerating its pivot toward AI-driven services.

Operating and financial highlights • Operating revenue stood at RMB 529.60 billion, essentially flat year-on-year; service revenue edged up 0.7% to RMB 485.40 billion. • EBITDA rose 2.1% to RMB 143.90 billion, pushing the EBITDA margin on service revenue to 29.6%. • Net profit increased 0.5% to RMB 33.20 billion, equivalent to basic EPS of RMB 0.36. • Capital expenditure fell 14.1% to RMB 80.40 billion, lifting free cash flow to RMB 44.70 billion. • The Board proposes a final dividend of RMB 0.0908 per share; together with the interim dividend of RMB 0.1812, the full-year payout reaches RMB 0.2720 per share, representing 75% of 2025 earnings.

Business trends • Fundamental businesses generated RMB 330.50 billion, up 0.7%. Mobile subscribers reached 439 million, with 5G penetration at 68.8%. Broadband users totalled 201 million, and gigabit penetration hit 31.6%. • Industrial Digitalisation revenue increased 0.5% to RMB 147.30 billion. Within this:  – China Telecom Cloud contributed RMB 120.70 billion, securing the No. 2 share in China’s public-cloud IaaS market and a top-3 position in IaaS + PaaS.  – AIDC revenue was RMB 34.50 billion; security services RMB 16.60 billion; intelligent services RMB 12.30 billion.  – High-growth niches recorded strong momentum: IoVT +31.2%, quantum +65.4%, satellite +30.7%.

Strategy and technology • Corporate strategy was upgraded to “Cloudification, Digital Transformation and AI for Good”, centred on the Five-Sphere Integrated intelligent cloud system that covers computing power, platform, data, model and application layers. • Self-owned and accessed intelligent computing power reached 91 EFLOPS; the proprietary “Xingchen” full-modal large-model system underpins more than 250 internal AI applications. • R&D expenses climbed 7.3% to RMB 15.60 billion, funding breakthroughs in 6G, quantum computing and secure AI governance.

Balance sheet and liquidity • Total assets were RMB 870.64 billion; debt-to-asset ratio declined 1.1 ppt to 46.2%. • Total indebtedness fell to RMB 10.02 billion, with 98.1% denominated in Renminbi. • Net cash from operations amounted to RMB 125.07 billion; unutilised credit facilities stood at RMB 207.11 billion.

Outlook Management positions AI-centred services as the primary growth engine for the new 15th Five-Year Plan period beginning 2026, targeting continued expansion of token-based services, further upgrades to intelligent infrastructure and an enhanced dividend policy aligned with cash-flow generation.