Meanwhile, the Chinese yuan firmed against the US dollar on Friday as China's exports rose more than expected in December from a year ago.

The yuan closed its onshore trading at 6.4680. That's almost 300 basis points higher than its previous night session fix. The yuan's strength was underpinned by China's better-than-expected exports growth in December. The yuan strengthened 6.8 percent against the dollar last year, reversing three straight years of depreciation. The trend continued into the new year, breaching the psychologically important level of 6.5 against the dollar.