Greece's state statistics agency on Friday drastically revised downwards the economy's third-quarter contraction to 0.9 percent, from 0.5 percent previously.

"These differences are on account of using new data, not available at the time of the flash estimate," the Elstat agency said, citing a mixture of September balance of payments data, service turnover and jobless figures as factors for the downturn.

Taiwan on Friday cut its growth forecast for 2015 for the second time since August, to 1.06 percent, while also lowering expectations for next year amid slumping exports.

The full-year figure was adjusted down 0.50 percentage points from August when the Directorate General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics made the previous estimate. 

The euro on Friday hovered around seven-month lows on the dollar and was also weak against Asian currencies on speculation that the European Central Bank will unleash fresh stimulus measures next week.

Further action by the ECB to boost the 19-nation eurozone economy was likely to heap pressure on Asian policymakers to loosen their own monetary policy in a bid to push down their units to stay competitive, analysts said.

The volume of loans to the private sector in the euro area expanded in October, with a bigger bounce recorded than the previous month, ECB data showed on Thursday, suggesting a massive stimulus program may be working.

The data are for the European Central Bank a key indicator of economic health, as borrowing is a main source for corporate investment which in turn should boost the eurozone's currently weak economy.

The Philippine economy grew slower than expected in the third quarter, as risks from a leadership change next year and the El Nino dry spell loomed, the government said Thursday.

The slowdown comes after years of sustained growth in the Philippines, formerly known as the "Sick Man" of Asia because of its poor economic performance.

The euro struggled in Asia Thursday as expectations grew that the European Central Bank will announce a boost to its monetary stimulus measures next week.

Bets that the ECB will go further to boost the 19-nation eurozone economy have pushed down the currency, and rekindled speculation that it may soon hit parity with the dollar for the first time since 2002.

Pakistan's parliament has approved amendments to an anti-money laundering law to make it more effective in targeting the financing of extremists and bring it into line with global standards, officials said Thursday.

The National Assembly, the lower chamber of the federal parliament, unanimously approved the amendments on Wednesday, two weeks after the Senate passed it, parliamentary officials said.

Britain's Labor has been accused of lurching left since Jeremy Corbyn became leader, so when one of his key allies quoted Mao Zedong's Little Red Book in parliament Wednesday, Conservative opponents were delighted.

John McDonnell, the main opposition's finance spokesman, was giving his party's response to finance minister George Osborne's budget update in the House of Commons when he pulled out a copy of the Chinese revolutionary leader's book of quotations.

Brazilian police on Wednesday arrested a senior ruling party senator and a billionaire investment banker in the intensifying probe of a huge corruption network centered on state oil giant Petrobras.

Senator Delcidio Amaral, who leads President Dilma Rousseff's Workers' Party in the upper house, was the first sitting legislator to be arrested in the widening corruption scandal.

Europe is facing the specter of attacks by Islamic State (IS) jihadists with police numbers in some countries hit by austerity cuts, raising questions about whether this is making it easier for assailants to slip through the net.

Following this month's Paris attacks in which 130 people died, other EU nations are on high alert.