The U.S. Labor Department released its jobless claims figures on Thursday. The number of initial jobless claims in the week ending January 30 in the U.S. rose by 8,000 to 285,000 from 277,000 in the previous week. The previous week's figure was revised down from 278,000.

Analysts had expected jobless claims to increase to 280,000.

Jobless claims remained below 300,000 the 48th straight week. This threshold is associated with the strengthening of the labour market.

Continuing jobless claims declined by 18,000 to 2,255,000 in the week ended January 23.