China Mobile seeks buying opportunities in emerging markets*****

HONG KONG, May 19 (Reuters): China Mobile Ltd, the world's largest mobile operator by market value, is seeking acquisition opportunities in emerging markets such as Myanmar to expand its foothold overseas, its chairman said Thursday. The dominant mobile carrier in China invested around $300 million last year in Pakistan, where the telecom sector has boomed over the past decade with around 100 million mobile phone subscribers. China Mobile has already hit around 10 million subscribers in Pakistan, "and if we can break even next year, that will certainly give us more confidence to invest in emerging markets," Wang Jianzhou, chairman of China Mobile, told a news conference after a shareholders' meeting. China Mobile has been trying to make inroads in overseas markets, though not all its attempts have been successful. Its move to purchase a 12-per cent stake in Taiwan's Far Eastone process has been stalled due to the Taiwan government's worries over national security. Wang also said the company would not be issuing new shares if it decided to list A-shares in China, but gave no further details. "We don't need the money. We have enough cash," Wang said. Within its home market, China Mobile plans to spend around 10 billion yuan ($1.5 billion) this year to expand its WiFi network, he said. Like peers China Unicom and China Telecom Corp Ltd, China Mobile has been trying to reverse a decline in average revenue per user (ARPU) by attracting more users to value-added mobile services. On Thursday, company executives said they expected the company's ARPU to fall further, in line with analysts' views, as many users were from the lower end of the market in the country's rural areas. China Mobile's ARPU fell fell to 67 yuan ($10.27) per month in the first quarter from 76 in the fourth quarter last year. In April the carrier, which has more than 600 million users, posted a 5.4-per cent rise in first-quarter net profit to 26.9 billion yuan ($4.1 billion). Its shares, which have lost 10 per cent since the start of the year, fell 0.36 per cent as of 0722 GMT Thursday, underperforming the main Hang Seng Index's 0.70 per cent gain.