What you need2know:

SPI futures down 24pts at 5518

• AUD at 77.39 US cents, 90.83 Japanese yen, 68.48 Euro cents and 51.29 British pence

• On Wall St, S&P 500 -1.3%, Dow -1.5%, Nasdaq -1%

• In Europe, Stoxx 50 -0.6%, FTSE -0.9%, CAC -0.6%, DAX -0.4%

• Spot gold up $US28.50 or 2.3% to $US1283.10 an ounce

• Brent oil surged $US3.32 or 6.8% to $US52.45 per barrel

• Iron ore slipped 1.7% to $US62.21 per metric tonne

What's on today

Australia Ai Group PMI, RP Data house prices, TD inflation gauge, China HSBC PMI manufacturing, Japan PMI manufacturing, US PMI manufacturing, construction spending, ISM manufacturing, Canada PMI manufacturing.

Stocks to watch

Bradken: Macquarie dropped Bradken to 'neutral' with a price target of $2.80, while Bell Potter put its forecast for Bradken's earnings, price target and recommendation 'under review'. The moves came after Bradken said PEP and Bain Capital won't proceed with their bid for the company.

Fortescue Metals: Deutsche Bank has increased its earnings and valuation of the miner, but retained a 'hold' on its stock because of high gearing and the weak demand outlook for iron ore.

Beach Energy: RBC Capital Markets has a 'sector perform' rating on the energy company and a price target of $1.25 a share.

Currencies

The US dollar index advanced for a seventh straight month in January, marking the longest streak of monthly gains since the greenback was floated as a fiat currency in 1971. On the day however, the index was off 0.10 per cent.

"Monetary divergence continues to dominate foreign exchange markets. The fundamental case for dollar strength is still in place as a long-term theme," said Brian Daingerfield, currency strategist at Royal Bank of Scotland in Stamford, Connecticut.

An unexpected move by Russia's central bank to cut its main interest rate on Friday to 15 per cent shows continued chaos in the country's economy, some of it due to Western sanctions related to the Ukraine crisis, a White House spokesman said.

Commodities

Oil prices roared back from six-year lows on Friday, rocketing more than 8 per cent as a record weekly decline in US oil drilling fueled a frenzy of short-covering.

Still production from OPEC rose in January to 30.37 million barrels per day (bpd), a Reuters poll showed, a sign that key members of the group were resolute about defending their market share.

Ore with 62 percent iron content delivered to the Chinese port of Qingdao declined 1.7 percent to $62.21 a dry ton on Friday, the lowest since Metal Bulletin started to compile the price index in 2009.

Vale on Friday said it will cut its annual dividend payout in half in the current year, or about $US2 billion, the lowest level since 2007.

United States

US stocks closed down on Friday after a volatile session as investors worried at the end of a rough month for the market about weak US growth data and whether instability in Europe could hurt corporate earnings in the United States.

"It feels like a flight-to-safety trade on a month-end. People are putting money into assets that have done well this month," said Peter Coleman, head trader at ConvergEx Group in New York.

Gross domestic product expanded at a 2.6 per cent annual pace after the third quarter's 5 per cent rate, the Commerce Department said in its first snapshot of fourth-quarter GDP.

Consumer spending, which accounts for more than two-thirds of US economic activity, advanced at a 4.3 per cent pace in the fourth quarter - the fastest since the first quarter of 2006 and an acceleration from the third quarter's 3.2 per cent pace.

Europe

European stocks dipped on Friday but posted their best monthly performance in over three years, lifted by hopes the European Central Bank's quantitative easing programme will revive the region's economic growth.

Morgan Stanley strategists upgraded their forecast for European earnings for the first time in three years, seeing an improvement in the region's economic momentum this year.

"After four years of persistent growth disappointment, we believe that Europe is on the verge of an upgrade cycle. This will be one of the dominant factors influencing investment returns in Europe this year," they said in a note.

Last week, European equities enjoyed $US5.1 billion of investment inflows, the biggest weekly amount since December 2013, according to data from BofA Merrill Lynch Global Research. European stocks have attracted $US7.2 billion in fresh money so far this year.

What happened Friday

The S&P/ASX 200 Index gained 18.8 points, or 0.3pc, to 5588.3.