U.S. equities posted solid gains in the week ending Feb. 7 as investors digested key economic data and corporate earnings reports.

For the week, the Dow was up 3 percent, the S&P 500 increased 3.17 percent, and the Nasdaq gained 4.03 percent.

On the data front, U.S. total nonfarm payroll employment rose by 225,000 in January, and the unemployment rate was little changed at 3.6 percent, the U.S. Labor Department said on Friday.

Notable job gains occurred in construction, health care, and transportation and warehousing, the department said.

According to a separate report released on Thursday by the department, the number of Americans filing for unemployment benefits dropped to a nine-month low in the week ending Feb. 1.

The seasonally adjusted initial claims for the week was 202,000, a decrease of 15,000 from the previous week's revised level. The four-week moving average was 211,750, a decrease of 3,000 from the previous week's revised average, the department said.

U.S. private sector employment increased by 291,000 jobs from December to January, payroll data company Automatic Data Processing reported Wednesday. The reading topped market consensus.

The headline U.S. non-manufacturing index registered 55.5 percent, up 0.6 percentage point from the December reading, according to the Institute for Supply Management on Wednesday. The increase slightly exceeded the MarketWatch forecast of 55 percent.

The Institute for Supply Management (ISM) said on Monday that the January purchasing managers' index (PMI) registered 50.9 percent, an increase of 3.1 percentage points from the previous month's reading.

"Global trade remains a cross-industry issue, but many respondents were positive for the first time in several months," said Timothy Fiore, chair of the ISM Manufacturing Business Survey Committee.

In corporate news, Twitter shares soared 15 percent on Thursday after the company reported strong user numbers for the fourth quarter.

The social media company said its average monetizable daily active usage (mDAU) reached 152 million for the quarter, up 21 percent year on year.

It reported revenue of 1.01 billion U.S. dollars and non-GAAP diluted net income per share of 0.25 dollars.