China Telecom (0728), the nation's biggest fixed-line phone company, added a record number of high- speed Internet users last month, helping the company counter a loss in telephone subscribers.

China Telecom gained 890,000 broadband customers for a total of 40 million at the end of June, the Beijing-based company said.

That was the highest number of monthly additions since the carrier started publishing the data in 2007.

Chairman Wang Xiaochu increased spending on broadband networks last year to boost customer numbers in the world's biggest Internet market.

Web users in China exceeded 221 million in February, overtaking the U.'s 220 million, according to the state-run Xinhua News Agency.

Source:BLOOMBERG