BlackRock's Rieder expects Fed to raise rates twice in 2017

While the November U.S. jobs report, released earlier on Friday, was not as robust as some analysts had forecast, it "unquestionably sets the Fed up for a December policy rate hike," Rick Rieder, BlackRock's chief investment officer of global fixed income, said in a statement.

After a rate increase later this month, the U.S. central bank "will then likely move twice more by the end of next year," Rieder said.

(Reporting by Richard Leong; Editing by Paul Simao)