The head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) predicted on Friday that the global economy recover early next year but said the financial system would still need to be monitored closely after that.

We expect to get out of the crisis early in 2010, especially if a clean-up of certain segments of the financial system is carried out, IMF Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn told a conference in Morocco, according to Reuters.

But we should not forget the task of continuing to monitor the global system once we emerge from the crisis, he added.

The U.S. economy shrank less than expected, according to a government report released Friday. The Gross Domestic Product fell 5.7 percent instead of a forecast of 6.1 percent decline.

"The return to growth does not mean the end of the consequences of the crisis,' he said.

Morocco International Monetary Fund